Tombstone
Born: February 1977 – The Williamsport Tomahawks relocate to Jersey City, NJ
Affiliation Change: 1978 (Jersey City A’s)
First Game: April 15, 1977 (L 3-2 vs. Bristol Red Sox)
Last Game: September 3, 1977 (W 2-1, L 8-7 @ Reading Phillies)
Eastern League Championships: None
Stadium
Roosevelt Stadium (24,000, downscaled to 12,400 for baseball)11977 West Haven Yankees Program
Opened: 1937
Demolished: 1985
Ownership & Affiliation
Owner: Bob Auerbach
Major League Affiliation: Cleveland Indians
Attendance
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Source: The Encyclopedia of Minor League Baseball (3rd ed.), Lloyd Johnson & Miles Wolff, 2007
Background
The Jersey City Indians were a dreadful Class AA farm club of the Cleveland Indians that competed for just one season in the Eastern League during the summer of 1977. The ball club arrived in town in February 1977, transplanted from Williamsport, Pennsylvania, just two months prior to opening day. The move marked the return of professional baseball to Jersey City for the first time since the departure of the triple-A Jersey City Jerseys in 1961.
The Indians played at cavernous Roosevelt Stadium, an Art Deco Works Progress Administration project named for New Deal architect Franklin D. Roosevelt. The stadium’s vast expanse – 25,000 seats, scaled down slightly to 12,400 for Indians games – was one of the club’s problems. Jersey City crowds typically numbered in the hundreds.
The team was lousy on the field. Jersey City finished with a 40-97 record, easily the worst performance in the 8-team Eastern League in 1977. In fact, Jersey City placed a whopping 22.5 games behind the E.L.’s 7th place team, the Reading Phillies, in the standings.
Eight Jersey City Indians eventually advanced to the Major Leagues, including seven pitchers. By far the most accomplished Jersey City grad was 21-year old pitcher Jim Clancy. Clancy went on to win 140 games in the Majors and was named to the American League All-Star team in 1982 as a member of the Toronto Blue Jays. Clancy was the last Jersey City Indian player active in professional baseball when he pitched his final Major League game in 1991.
Demise
One week after the 1977 season ended, Cleveland announced that it was pulling out of Jersey City and would place its Class AA ball club with Chattanooga, Tennessee of the Southern League in 1978. Cleveland displaced the Oakland A’s as Chattanooga’s parent club and Oakland ended up sponsoring Jersey City in 1978 in an effective swap of farm clubs.
Oakland also left town after one season, moving their Eastern League operation to Waterbury, Connecticut in 1979. Professional baseball never returned to Jersey City after 1978.
Roosevelt Stadium was demolished in 1985.
Fun While It Lasted is searching for a souvenir program, photos or other memorabilia from the 1977 Jersey City Indians to improve this entry. Please contact us if you can help!
In Memoriam
Outfielder Garry Hancock, who went on to play in the Majors for the Red Sox and Oakland A’s between 1978 and 1984, passed away at age 61 on October 10th, 2015.
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2 Responses
In doing research on this team, it seems that local papers consistently refer to the team as “Jersey Indians” not just for the 1977 season, but also for the 1978 season as well, event though they were affiliated with Oakland that year.
Yes They we’re called the Indians. I was 11 and 12 the 2 years the Indians were in my Jersey City. My most memorable was running around the field after the game and I saw Rickey Henderson and I shouted to him ‘ “ Hey Rickey when you get to Oakland tell Charlie O to trade you to the Mets!” and he just looked at me like I was crazy LOL!