Ban Johnson AL PRES 10/14/09

This entry catalogs a Sporting News Supplement of American League president Byron Bancroft "Ban" Johnson dated October 14, 1909 — printed at the close of a season in which the league he had built was in its ninth year of operation as a recognized major league. Johnson was not a player but the architect and chief executive of the AL, having converted the Western League into a rival big league in 1901 and forced the National League to terms in the 1903 peace agreement that established the modern two-league structure and the World Series. The supplement files him by his title — AL PRES — rather than by any uniform association, and the dateline 10/14/09 lands the sheet during the 1909 World Series between Pittsburgh and Detroit. Johnson ran the American League with autocratic vigor through 1927, when failing health and a clash with Commissioner Landis pushed him out. He died March 28, 1931 in St. Louis, Missouri, and was elected to the Hall of Fame in 1937 by the Centennial Commission as one of the founders of the modern game.