RetroSimba

Charlie Peete, a highly regarded Cardinals outfield prospect, died in a violent accident as he was on the verge of fulfilling his potential with the big-league club.

On Nov. 27, 1956, four months after he made his major-league debut with the Cardinals, Peete, 27, was killed in an airplane crash in Venezuela. His wife and three children also died in the crash.

Peete was a potent left-handed batter. Playing for the Cardinals’ Omaha affiliate, managed by Johnny Keane, Peete was the 1956 batting champion of the Class AAA American Association. Peete was planning to play winter ball before reporting to spring training as a strong contender for a starting spot in the Cardinals’ outfield.

Path to the majors

Peete was born Feb. 22, 1929, in Franklin, Va., and went to high school in Portsmouth, Va. After serving a two-year hitch in the Army, Peete began his professional baseball career with the independent Portsmouth team in the Piedmont League. The Cardinals signed him in 1954 and he advanced to Class AAA the next year. Because of his thick build (190 pounds) and short frame (5 feet 9), Peete was nicknamed “Mule.”

In July 1956, Peete was promoted from Omaha to the Cardinals. Hampered by a split thumb, he hit .192 in 23 games for St. Louis and made 13 starts in center.

There were some highlights.

Peete got his first major-league hit, a single to left, off the Dodgers’ Roger Craig on July 21, 1956, at St. Louis. Boxscore

Five days later, July 26, Peete had his most significant game in the majors, hitting a two-run triple off Phillies ace Robin Roberts, giving the Cardinals a 7-6 lead and propelling them to a 14-9 victory at Philadelphia. Boxscore

Peete also had a RBI-triple against the Pirates’ Ron Kline on Aug. 1 at Pittsburgh. Boxscore

Peete had his batting average above .250 before going into an 0-for-13 tailspin that led to his being sent back to Omaha. He finished the minor-league season with a .350 batting mark, winning the American Association hitting crown. The runner-up was Yankees prospect Tony Kubek (.331).

The Sporting News suggested Peete’s performance “made him one of the brightest prospects in the Redbirds system” and rated him a “highly regarded outfielder.”

Omaha general manager Bill Bergesch predicted to the Associated Press that Peete would be a Cardinals contributor in 1957. “I don’t think there’s any doubt about that,” Bergesch said. “He can do everything the rest of them (in the majors) do _ plus hit the ball a little harder than most.”

Disaster in Venezuela

Accepting a chance to play winter ball in Cuba, Peete signed with a Cienfuegos team that included Senators pitchers Camilo Pascual and Pedro Ramos. Peete expected to spend the winter in Cuba, but he slumped early and was released.

The Valencia team in the Venezuela winter league wanted Peete. He could have flown from Cuba to Venezuela to begin play. Instead, Peete chose to return to the United States to meet his wife, Nettie, and their children, Ken, Karen and Deborah, and bring them to Venezuela with him.

At 10 p.m. on Nov. 26, the Peete family boarded a commercial flight at Idlewild Airport in New York. The plane was scheduled to arrive in Caracas at about 7 a.m. on Nov. 27.

The flight was late. At 8:05 a.m., the French pilot, Capt. Marcel Combalbert, 34, radioed to the control tower that he was preparing his approach to the airport.

It was raining and foggy. Clouds limited visibility.

About two miles from the airport, the four-engine Constellation slammed into a 6,000-foot mountain top. All 25 people _ 18 passengers and seven crew _ on board were killed.

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Grant Dunlap possessed a variety skills. He was a winning coach in multiple sports, an accomplished author and a pinch-hitter deluxe for the Cardinals.

Dunlap played his lone big-league season with the 1953 Cardinals.

A Stockton, Calif., native, Dunlap, 17, was signed by the Reds in 1941. He was given an $870 bonus and used the money to pay for surgery for his mother. A year later, he joined the Marines, became an officer and served in the South Pacific and China during World War II.

In 1952, Dunlap was the Texas League batting champion, hitting .333 for Shreveport. The first baseman, a right-handed hitter, was purchased by the Cardinals in December 1952 and placed on the big-league roster. The Cardinals said Dunlap would compete with Steve Bilko and Dick Sisler for the everyday first base role.

Ready to hit

A 29-year-old rookie, Dunlap made a favorable impression when he joined the Cardinals at their spring training camp at St. Petersburg, Fla., in February 1953.

In its March 11 edition, The Sporting News reported, “Perhaps the outstanding ‘sleeper’ in camp is Grant Dunlap … In the early batting drills, he attracted attention and in the first squad game he swung at the first pitch and whacked the ball far over the left field wall into Tampa Bay. Dunlap looks like a hitter. He poises his bat and is ready for every pitch.”

Said Cardinals manager Eddie Stanky: “Dunlap looks pretty shifty around first base, too.”

Two weeks later, The Sporting News wrote, “Grant Dunlap is another substantial hitter on the Cardinals squad and may remain because of his prowess with the war club.”

Wounded warrior

Late in spring training, during an exhibition game against the Braves, Dunlap suffered an injury that derailed his chances of winning the first base job. After stroking a single, Dunlap was on first when Hal Rice hit a grounder to second baseman Jack Dittmer. Dunlap braked to avoid a tag and Dittmer threw out Rice at first.

First baseman Joe Adcock then pursued Dunlap, who got trapped in a rundown. In the frenzy, Adcock accidently stepped on Dunlap’s left foot. Dunlap suffered “a five-suture spike wound” near the instep and was “carried off the field on a stretcher to minimize bleeding,” The Sporting News reported.

Bilko opened the season as the Cardinals’ starting first baseman. Stanky kept Dunlap on the roster as a pinch-hitter.

St. Louis slugger

Dunlap’s first two big-league hits were significant.

In his third big-league at-bat, Dunlap got his first hit _ a pinch-hit home run off Ken Raffensberger in a 5-2 Reds victory at Cincinnati on May 10, 1953. Boxscore

A month later, Dunlap got his second hit and it produced a Cardinals victory.

On June 12, 1953, at New York’s Polo Grounds, the Giants led the Cardinals, 1-0. In the seventh, with Cardinals runners on first and second, one out, Dunlap drove a pinch-hit triple off the right field wall against Dave Koslo. Ray Jablonski and Rip Repulski scored, giving the Cardinals a 2-1 lead. Pitcher Harvey Haddix ran for Dunlap and scored on Solly Hemus’ sacrifice fly. The Cardinals won, 3-1. Boxscore

Used primarily as a pinch-hitter, Dunlap batted .353 (6-for-17) for the Cardinals, but couldn’t displace Bilko at first base and wasn’t getting at-bats. In August, the Cardinals sent Dunlap to their minor-league affiliate at Houston. Stanky predicted Dunlap would be “a terrific man” for Houston given the chance to play regularly.

On Aug. 11, 1953, Dunlap went 5-for-5 for Houston in a game against Dallas. He hit .277 in 35 games for Houston.

Life after baseball

After the season, the Cardinals sold Dunlap’s contract to their Rochester affiliate. In December 1953, Rochester traded Dunlap to another Class AAA club, Minneapolis, for pitcher Bill Connelly.

Dunlap spent the 1954 and 1955 seasons in the minor leagues. Then he began a successful second career.

An all-conference baseball and basketball player at Occidental College, Dunlap returned to the Los Angeles school in 1955 and coached both sports teams.

In 30 years as Occidental baseball coach, Dunlap had a 510-316 record and won nine conference titles. He was 205-156 with five league championships in 16 years as Occidental basketball coach. Dunlap also was the Occidental athletic director from 1971-76. He retired in 1984.

Dunlap wrote an acclaimed mystery novel “Kill the Umpire” that was published in 1998. Dunlap was praised for his vivid, lively prose, drawing on his minor-league experience to recreate the feel of the Texas League towns of the 1940s and what it was like to be a ballplayer in that time. The book is available on Amazon.

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As a teen-ager, Bobby Tolan was a premier prospect for the Cardinals and was given a chance to displace Mike Shannon as the right fielder.

Tolan was 19 when he debuted in right field for the Cardinals on Sept. 3, 1965. Batting leadoff, Tolan was 1-for-4 against the Mets. He singled to center in his first at-bat, but was picked off by pitcher Dick Selma and tagged out in a rundown. Boxscore

Sprinter speed

A left-handed batter, Tolan, 17, was signed by the Pirates in 1963 as an amateur free agent out of Fremont High School in Los Angeles. His cousin, Eddie Tolan, had been called the world’s fastest human after winning gold medals in the 100-meter and 200-meter sprints for the United States in the 1932 Olympic Games at Los Angeles.

After a season in the Pirates’ system, Tolan was left off the big-league roster and selected by the Cardinals in the December 1963 minor-league draft.

Converted from first baseman to outfielder by the Cardinals, Tolan made an immediate impact, hitting .297 with 34 stolen bases for Class AA Tulsa and being named to the Texas League all-star team.

In 1965, Tolan continued to impress. He hit .290 with 45 stolen bases for Class AAA Jacksonville.

A 1965 profile of Tolan in The Sporting News was headlined, “Teen-ager Tolan A Blur On Bases, Whiz With Stick.”

After Jacksonville beat the Dodgers in an exhibition game that year, Dodgers shortstop Maury Wills said, “He could challenge my base-stealing record.”

Said Dodgers catcher John Roseboro: “The kid looks too good to be true.”

Grover Resinger, who managed Tolan in consecutive seasons at Tulsa and Jacksonville, filed glowing reports to the Cardinals.

Another Billy Williams

“He’s improving all the time,” Resinger said. “… He’s going to be one of the better hitters in the game. He’s a line-drive hitter, with good power to all fields. Bobby is a Billy Williams type of hitter. He’s going to get stronger and I think he has a good chance to become a 25- to 30-homer hitter.”

Late in the 1965 season, Bob Howsam, Cardinals general manager, decided to give Tolan a chance to be St. Louis’ everyday right fielder for the final month of the season.

Shannon, who had become the Cardinals’ regular right fielder in the second half of 1964, struggled in 1965. He hit .221 and had almost as many strikeouts (46) as hits (54). The Cardinals’  backup right fielders _ Tito Francona (.259) and Phil Gagliano (.240) _ weren’t long-term solutions.

Howsam also was thinking ahead to 1966 when the Cardinals would move into their spacious new home, Busch Stadium II. He envisioned Tolan joining Lou Brock and Curt Flood in an outfield of speedsters who could chase down fly balls in the big stadium. Howsam also liked the thought of Tolan running the bases.

“His base-stealing ability is unlimited,” Resinger said of Tolan. “I think he’ll eventualy steal 50 bases in the big leagues. He’s not as fast as Brock, but he is above average.”

Too much, too soon

Tolan made 17 September starts in right field for the 1965 Cardinals, but he was overmatched at the plate. He hit .188 (13 hits in 17 games).

That performance prompted Howsam to alter his plans. After the 1965 season, the Cardinals acquired outfielder Alex Johnson from the Phillies. The Cardinals opened the 1966 season with Johnson in left, Flood in center and Brock shifting from left to right.

Johnson started poorly, though, and by mid-May was sent to the minors. The Cardinals moved Brock back to left and reinserted Shannon in right.

Tolan hit .172 in 43 games for the 1966 Cardinals. He was a backup to Roger Maris in right for the 1967-68 Cardinals clubs that won consecutive National League pennants and a World Series title.

After the 1968 season, the Cardinals traded Tolan to the Reds for right fielder Vada Pinson. Tolan was reunited with Howsam, who had become the Reds’ general manager.

Given a starting outfield spot, Tolan thrived with Cincinnati. He fulfilled Resinger’s prediction, producing a league-high 57 steals for the 1970 Reds. In four seasons with Cincinnati, Tolan hit .282 with 140 steals and helped the Reds win pennants in 1970 and 1972.

In a 13-year major league career with the Cardinals, Reds, Padres, Phillies and Pirates, Tolan hit .265 with 193 steals.

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