James Laurie "Deacon" White (December 7 1847 - July 7 1939) was an American professional baseball player in the National Association throughout its 5-year existence, and later for 15 seasons in the National League and Players League of Major League Baseball. His brother Will was a major league pitcher, and briefly his teammate. Born in Caton, New York, Deacon White's pro career began in 1868 with the Forest City club, at a time when no team was entirely composed of professional players. He was a catcher and third baseman, playing through 1890, whose long career allowed him to play with many of the legendary characters of 19th century professional baseball. White played on the great National Association Boston Red Stockings teams of the early 1870s. He also played with Cap Anson and Al Spalding in Chicago, King Kelly in Cincinnati, Dan Brouthers in Buffalo, Ned Hanlon and Sam Thompson in Detroit, as well as Jake Beckley and Pud Galvin in Pittsburgh.

White led his respective league in batting average twice, and runs batted in three times. He started out early enough to have played against the undefeated Cincinnati Red Stockings of , baseball's first all-professional team. He was considered the best barehanded catcher of his time, as well as one of the best third baseman during the second half of his career. To top it all off, in the rough-and-tumble 19th-century baseball era, Deacon really was a nonsmoking, Bible-toting, church-going deacon.

According to Lee Allen in The National League Story (1961), White was one of the last people to believe that the earth is flat. He tried and failed to convince his teammates that they were living on a flat plane and not a globe; they ridiculed him. Then one asked to be convinced, and the Deacon gave him an argument suited to the hypothesis that the earth is not really turning. He convinced the teammate but the argument would not prove that the earth is not a sphere.

He died in Aurora, Illinois at the age of 91.

In August 2008, he was named as one of the ten former players that began their careers before 1943 to be considered by the Veterans Committee for induction into the National Baseball Hall of Fame in 2009.

Highlight

• White earned the first hit in baseball's first fully professional league ? a double off of Bobby Mathews of the Fort Wayne Kekiongas in the first inning of the first game in National Association history on May 4, 1871. He also made the first catch.

See also

• Baseball Hall of Fame balloting, 2009
• List of major league players with 2,000 hits
• List of Major League Baseball players with 1000 runs
• List of Major League Baseball RBI champions
• List of Major League Baseball batting champions
• List of Major League Baseball triples champions
• 1887 Detroit Wolverines season

External links

• BaseballLibrary.com - biography and career highlights

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