By Ann Boutwell
My Uncle Red – William Russell Rollings (1904-1964) – entered the realm of baseball shouting “peanuts, peanuts” at the old Monroe Park grandstand on Mobile Bay in Alabama.
By 1924, he was playing for the Mobile Bears and then was signed on as infielder/outfielder and third baseman for the Boston Red Sox in 1927. The Boston Herald called Uncle Red’s southern accent “Dixie talk,” and he was described him as a gentlemen who was always a class act, even when catching foul balls.
Red played for the Red Sox through the 1928 season and then with the Boston Braves in 1930, totaling 184 games and 355 at-bats in his major league career. During a short stint in 1929 with the Hollywood Stars team, Red captured a role in the silent movie Fast Company, playing himself. The comedy chronicles the rise of Elmer Kane, a country rube played by Jackie Oakie, who becomes a baseball legend for the New York Yankees. Not only does he help the team win the World Series against the Pittsburgh Pirates, he also beats a group of gangsters all by himself.
In March 1933, Red signed with the Atlanta Crackers and played in the old Ponce de Leon Park. The same year the Goudey Gum Company produced a 240 card set called “Big League Chewing Gum.” These cards, issued with bubble gum in each pack, were the first baseball gum cards. Uncle Red got his own card.
Jimmy Jones, an Atlanta Constitution sportswriter said, “a peek in the records shows that the languid, saffron-haired third baseman of the Crackers has played remarkably steady ball since his entrance to the lineup on April 21, 1933.”
Red was a utility player, one who could play several positions competently, a sort of jack of all trades. He would continue to play in the minor leagues until 1941.
To this day the city of Mobile fondly remembers the Best Loved Bears of 1947 who played in old Hartwell Field. The team finished the 1947 season with a record of 94-59. The coach was my Uncle Red. He died on New Year’s Eve 1964 and is buried in Mobile’s Pine Crest Cemetery.
I would hope Ann Boutwell would contact me. I am writing a book about the history of baseball in Mobile. I am interested in Red Rollings.