Kinston Indians

Kinston was represented by many amateur clubs since the late nineteenth century, but it was unable to sustain a viable professional team until the mid-1920s.[1] Earlier attempts included an aborted campaign in the Class D Eastern Carolina League in 1908[2] and an "outlaw league" team in 1921 and 1922. The latter was notable for being managed by former major league pitcher George Suggs and College Football Hall of Fame member Ira Rodgers.[3] Due to the efforts of the city's business leaders, former local amateur star Elisha Lewis, and George Suggs, the town secured a professional team in the Virginia League for the 1925 season[4] named the "Eagles".[5]

West End Park tickets: 1929.

The Eagles were a Class B team playing out of a then newly renovated stadium designed by Suggs known as West End Park.[6] The squad had little success against other teams in their league, but was successful enough in gate receipts to validate the city's capacity to sustain a professional team. Kinston's team remained in the Virginia League for three years and then migrated to a newly reformed Eastern Carolina League. This later affiliation collapsed along with the stock market in 1929.[7] The 1920s Eagles' roster included a young catcher named Rick Ferrell, who later had a long playing career and even longer front office career in the major leagues. In 1984, Ferrell became the only former Kinston player inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame.[8] Another player, Frank Armstrong, gave up baseball for a career in the armed services and became one of the most decorated generals in the history of the Air Force.[9]

The Great Depression took a great toll on the minor leagues, with only thirteen teams operating across the U.S. at a 1933 low point.[10] Like most, Kinston sat out the first few years of the Great Depression but reentered play for the 1934 season in the semi-professional Coastal Plain League. By 1937 the circuit had become a fully professional, Class D league as ranked by the National Association.[11] The city remained in the Coastal Plain League continuously until it was disbanded after 1952. As a member of this affiliation, Kinston saw many playoff appearances and won league championships in 1935 and 1947. Among the superior talent during this period was a young player named Charlie "King Kong" Keller who is listed as among the top forty major league players of all-time in terms of on-base percentage (.410).[12][13]

Kinston was without a team for the three-year period following the dissolution of the Coastal Plain League. In 1956, the owner of the Burlington Bees of the Carolina League moved his team to Kinston. At that time, the Carolina League was a Class B loop with teams located in Virginia and North Carolina.[14] The team, calling itself the Kinston Eagles, were a Pittsburgh Pirates affiliate and featured the city's first African American ball players. In these early days of the Civil Rights Movement, the black players in the Carolina League received much verbal and psychological abuse from the largely white, Southern fan base.[15] The first black players were Frank Washington and Carl Long.[16] Long excelled during the 1956 season, setting an RBI standard of 111 that has never been surpassed by any later Kinston hitter.[17] The racial experiment succeeded, but the team failed financially. The Eagles' owner was an inept businessman who brought the club near bankruptcy before it was moved 40 miles away to Wilson in 1957.[18][19]

Carl Long – 2006

Kinston's re-entry into Carolina League baseball in 1962 was successful both on the field and at the turnstile. The Eagles were able to claim the first of its Carolina League crowns. At a time when Kinston's population was only 25,000, the ball club attracted over 140,000 fans. Part of the lure was the talent supplied by Kinston's parent club, the Pittsburgh Pirates, which included Steve Blass (17–3, 1.97 ERA, 209 K's), and Frank Bork (19–7, 2.00 ERA).[20] Another fan attraction was that the Eagles were for the first time a community owned team, operating under the non-profit Kinston Eagles Baseball Company, run by an elected eighteen-man, unpaid board of directors. Profits were reinvested into improving the stadium, promoting the team, and supplying playing equipment for the youth of Kinston. This arrangement continued through all thirteen years of Kinston's second tenure in the Carolina League, from 1962 through 1974.[21]

In 1963 minor league baseball was restructured nationwide, with B, C and D classes eliminated.[10] The Carolina League became a High-A circuit. The Eagles failed to win any championships during this second era of Carolina League play, but they managed to make the playoffs in six of thirteen seasons. The Pirates stuck with Kinston through the 1965 campaign. During three of those four seasons, the Eagles were managed by Harding "Pete" Peterson, who later oversaw the Pirates farm system, and become the Pirates' general manager, helping to build the late seventies team that won the World Series.[22] The Eagles became affiliated with the new Atlanta Braves during 1966 and 1967, under the management of Andy Pafko.[23] From 1968 through 1973 the Eagles were affiliation with the New York Yankees; the fans saw a lot of future all-stars pass through the city including a young Ron Guidry who would soon establish himself as one of the best pitchers in the American League.[24]

During the 1970s the popularity of minor league baseball reached its lowest point and the attendance in Kinston fell to only 30,000 for the 1973 season. The city needed a revival of interest, and the Expos were turned to for help. The young Montreal franchise boasted a strong farm system with a lot of talent. So much talent in fact, that they decided to experiment with having two High A affiliates. Instead of dividing the players evenly between the two, all the top players were placed in the West Palm Beach club, while the newly renamed Kinston Expos had to make do with castoffs. The Kinston team soon found itself overmatched among its Carolina League rivals. The Expos fell to last place and attendance fell to only 27,000 for the year. Montreal declared the experiment a failure and withdrew from Kinston following the 1974 season. With no major league sponsor and very little fan support, Kinston likewise withdrew from the league.[25]

Former airline pilot Ray Kuhlman brought minor league baseball back to Kinston by investing in a Carolina League franchise in the late seventies. The renamed Kinston Eagles flew unaffiliated their first season back in the circuit in 1978. By the next campaign, they were associated with the Toronto Blue Jays. Toronto stayed with Kinston for seven years, and the team eventually took on the Blue Jay name. Kinston did not win any championships during the Blue Jays years. Kuhlman and his wife ran the team themselves and saw steady annual increases in attendance each year. The couple brought a string of marketing ideas to the team that have taken hold and remain to this day. These include increasing promotional days, fireworks displays, the introduction of Kinston baseball cards, an increase in branded souvenir merchandise, the establishment of the Kinston Professional Baseball Hall of Fame, and the hiring of a team mascot. Another fan attraction was a collection of future major league stars including Tony Fernández, Fred McGriff and Cecil Fielder.[26]

Following the 1985 season, the Blue Jays dropped Kinston as a franchise, and professional baseball in the city seemed to be in doubt once again. There was talk of moving the franchise to Charles County, Maryland, but the city remained in the Carolina League with an independent ball club that took on the Eagles name. 1986 proved to be disappointing in the standings and at the gate, and talk of a move was renewed, but ownership secured an affiliation with the Cleveland Indians during the off season.[27] For twenty-five years, Cleveland and the KTribe, as they came to be known, enjoyed a successful partnership which produced seventeen playoff appearances and five Carolina League championships (1988, 1991, 1995, 2004 and 2006).[28] The value of the team has risen along with its onfield success. In 1983, Kuhlman sold the team for $100,000. The franchise was sold again in 1985 for $225,000, and changed hands again in 1989 for $750,000. The team's value in 1992 was estimated at $1.5 million.[29]

Six figure attendance totals became the norm throughout the 1990s and into the new century. General Manager North Johnson fostered closer bonds with the mayor's office and helped create the Mayor's Committee for Professional Baseball in 1987.[30] Dedicated to increasing season ticket sales and promoting ties with businesses, the committee accomplished much in a short span of time. Attendance increased by nearly twenty thousand in 1987 and by more than twelve thousand the following year. By 1991, the number of fans through the turnstiles topped 100,000 for the first time since 1964. Although a new ownership group purchased the franchise in 1994, continuity in day-to-day operations was maintained through general manager North Johnson, and front office mainstay Shari Massengill who took over the reins in 2006.[31] The local government's dedication to keeping baseball in Kinston is evidenced by extensive new renovations to the ballpark.[32][33]

The Kinston Indians were last managed by Aaron Holbert, a former major league infielder. Their General Manager through the 2010 season, Shari Massengill,[31] and former Assistant General Manager, Jessie Hays, made up the only all-female General Manager/Assistant General Manager team in the Minor Leagues.[34] When Hays departed for the 2008 season, her replacement, Janell Bullock, was also female. The final GM was Benjamin Jones, who was previously employed by the Wilson Tobs.[35]

In 2007, the Indians won the Southern Division crown for both halves of the year, but they lost in the first round of the playoffs to the wild card team, the Salem Avalanche. It was the seventh season in a row that the Indians made the post season, which is a new Carolina League record formerly held by the Burlington Bees (1945–1950). It was the second time a Kinston team had accomplished this feat. The Kinston Eagles of the Coastal Plain League also made it to seven post seasons in a row (1946–1952).[36] Kinston's player development contract with Cleveland ended following the 2011 season. In 2012, the franchise moved to Zebulon, North Carolina and was renamed the Carolina Mudcats.

On August 22, 2016, the Texas Rangers announced plans to bring a minor league team back to Kinston.[37] The yet-to-be-named Class A-Advanced team will join the Carolina League starting in the 2017 season.[38]

• Blomberg, Ron with Dan Schlossberg (2006). Designated Hebrew: The Ron Blomberg Story. Sports Publishing. ISBN 1-58261-987-5.
• Guidry, Ron; Peter Golenbock (1980). Guidry. Prentice-Hall, Inc. ISBN 0-13-371609-0.
• Hall, Donald with Dock Ellis (1989) [1976]. Dock Ellis in the Country of Baseball. Simon & Schuster. ISBN 0-671-65988-X.
• Hargrove, Sharon; Richard Hauer Costa (1989). Safe at Home: A Baseball Wife's Story. Texas A & M University Press. ISBN 0-89096-376-2.
• Rhodes, Jean; Shawn Boburg (2009). Becoming Manny: Inside the Life of Baseball's Most Enigmatic Slugger. Scribner. ISBN 1-4165-7706-8.
• Thompson, Dick (2005). The Ferrell Brothers of Baseball. McFarland & Company, Inc. ISBN 0-7864-2006-5.
• Wells, David with Chris Kreski (2003). Perfect I'm Not: Boomer on Beer, Brawls, Backaches, and Baseball. HarperCollins Publishers, Inc. ISBN 0-06-050824-8.

• Chrisman, David F. (1988). The History of the Virginia League. Maverick Publications. ASIN B0006EQIN8.
• Gaunt, Robert (1997). We Would Have Played Forever: The Story of the Coastal Plain Baseball League. Baseball America, Inc. ISBN 0-945164-02-5.
• Holaday, J. Chris (1998). Professional Baseball in North Carolina: An Illustrated City-by-City History, 1901–1996. McFarland & Company, Inc. ISBN 0-7864-0532-5.
• Lloyd, Johnson; Miles Wolff, eds. (2007). The Encyclopedia of Minor League Baseball, third ed. Baseball America, Inc. ISBN 1-932391-17-7.
• Sumner, Jim L. (1994). Separating the Men From the Boys: The First Half-Century of the Carolina League. John F. Blair. ISBN 0-89587-112-2.

• The Kinston Daily Free Press. 1882–2011. Missing or empty |title= (help) – Issues for the 1908 season do not exist. Issues for all other seasons are available on microfilm at Lenoir Community College.

• Kinston Eagles/Expos/Blue Jays/Indians Programs and Roster Sheets. Missing or empty |title= (help) – Programs are also referred to as yearbooks.
• "Official league web site". Retrieved 2010-12-18.
• "Official team web site". Retrieved 2010-12-18.
• various editors (1956–2011). Carolina League Record Book. Sports Vue. – Over the years, this publication has also been known as Carolina League Media Guide and Record Book and Carolina League Directory and Record Book