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The first AFL season began May 12th, 1936. League President George Grant was
highly optimistic that the new league, which featured teams in seven Alabama towns and Panama City, Florida, would be a great success. Grant had been president of the Dixie Amateur League, which folded in 1935, and had been instrumental in organizing the ownership meetings in Troy that lead to the AFL’s creation. The new league’s birth out of the ashes of the Dixie Amateur League league was not an easy one: Many Troy supporters were against professional baseball, preferring the semi-pro version. Dothan, which had lost a great deal of money in the DAL, had already announced plans to join the Georgia-Florida League in 1936. Panama City had spent the 1935 season in the Georgia-Florida league, but the other franchises in the GFL were all in Georgia, and all within 75 miles of each other, which lead to the other owners to push Panama City out of the league. The Florida ownership were interested in the new league, and officially agreed to membership after the first few franchises signed on. Enterprise was the first franchise to join the league, and the Barons were also first to form an affiliation, in this case with the Birmingham Barons. Abbeville was the last team to join the league and was the first to leave it, folding at the mid-way point. The league tried to find a suitable replacement for the Abbeville franchise, but none was found so their remaining games and six rain-outs were forfeited. The new league had managed to attract a few experienced baseball men, mostly players on their way down the ladder. One such player was former major leaguer, Yam Yaryan. The Andalusia Reds, looking for an experienced player to guide young, inexperienced pitchers, signed Yaryan as their catcher. Yaryan had spent the 1921-22 seasons as back-up catcher for the Chicago White Sox, and had played minor league ball since then. Yaryan was born in 1892, which meant he was a 29-year old rookie when he joined the White Sox, and 43 years old when he joined the AFL. Baseball was a hot commodity in 1936, with numerous minor, semi-pro, independent, industrial, and Negro leagues drawing fans throughout the south. The AFL threw their hat into this competitive ring in the hopes that fans would be willing to support professional ball in the deep south’s smaller cities. Excitement was high enough in towns like Enterprise that half holidays were declared so that fans could make the 2:00 start time for the opener. The AFL format would be a 112 game season divided into halves. The winner of each half would meet in a season-ending playoff. The Troy Trojans put a crimp into that plan by winning both halves of the season. The contingency plan was that the other six remaining teams (Abbeville having withdrawn) would conduct a playoff to meet Troy in the Championship series. Once again, things didn’t work out quite the way the AFL planned: Andalusia won the right to face Troy in a best-of-seven playoff series and beat the league-dominating Trojans 4 games to 2 (there was one tie game also). Although Andalusia won the series, Troy was considered the league champions. |
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The 1936 Season
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Troy Meetings Give Birth To New League
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Season Highlights & Events
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The Panama City club went by three different nicknames during 1936: Pelicans, Pilots,
and Papermakers. |
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Panama City’s Kraft Paper Mill
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Ozark was the first AFL team to have affiliation with a major league team: The St.
Louis Cardinals |
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2000 fans saw the championship game which Andalusia won, 6-2.
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H. L. Dowling, of Ozark, was the first Secretary-Treasurer of the league.
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Several 1936 players moved up to higher level clubs for 1937:
Claude Pittman of Andalusia moved up to the Atlanta Crackers (Class A), Bill Casey & Bob Schirmser of Troy moved up to the Milwaukee Brewers (Class AA), Bill Thaxton of Panama City moved up to the Chattanooga Lookouts (Class A), Alvin Tennant of Enterprise moved up to parent club the Birmingham Barons (Class AA), Joe Gonzales and Carl McNabb of Ozark moved up to the Nashville Volunteers (Class A1), and Tom Lanning of Dothan moved up to the Dallas Steers (Class A1). |
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Darwin Cobb, star pitcher for Panama City, was the son of Ty Cobb’s brother: Paul.
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Everett « Yam Yaryan |
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Wecome to the AFL
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Goodbye
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Abbeville dropped out of the league on August 2nd.
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1936 AFL players who played in the majors:
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Bill Casey – Troy Catcher
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Claude Pittman – Andalusia
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« That whole area ( along Beach Drive) was just rush and swamp. They had to
fill in that whole area to make Panama City. Where the railroad depot is now, there used to be a small bayou, surrounded by more swamps…the games were played without umpires…..often players got to fighting and soon everyone joined in….Players didn’t have uniforms and (made) their own leather gloves. They made their own bats and balls from wood and twine. « . Alex Brown, interviewed in the Panama City News Herald, recalling local ball in Panama City in 1909. |
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C:\AFLweb\aflintro.cpg
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C:\AFLweb\afl1936-2.cpg
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C:\AFLweb\afl seasons index.cpg
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