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Show r' " Baseball may lose, temporarily at ' Jleast, Its greatest lighter. i Byron Bancroft Johnson, the man who made the American league possi- bio; the never-say-dle, two-handed ' scrapper who took up the issue against H. the powerful National league organiza- H! tlon and made its officials recognize , his organization as an equal, then : ruled his league with czar-liko autoc- j I 'racy; who fought tho Federal league : loff itB feet, declares ho is through i with baseball until after the war. Hi g Johnson seldom makes a statement I he is not ready to back up with action. 8 When ho declared, during tho world $ series that he intended to quit base-' base-' hall and enlist in government service 'r, in France, many thought he was H "bluffing." When he repeated tho j statement they sat up and took notice. I I Johnson has not yet resigned. Maybe H he won't go to France, but his state-Hr state-Hr mcnts have caused a lot of comment H; on whom his probable success will bo should be resign. H' Hight now indications are that should Johnson resign his place will H. ' bo taken by Edward G. Barrow, presi- Hb- dent of the International league, next to Johnson the greatest fighter in baseball. One glance at Barrow's bulldog jaw brands him as a fighter and long before be-fore he became known In International league circles his pugnacity had carried car-ried him through many battles in business busi-ness llfo and minor leaguedom. His great fights became against tho Federal league when he matched wits and ability against Jim Gilmore, waging wag-ing an even fight against the powerful money interests backing the Feds, although al-though he had practically no money to carry on tho fight with. Barrow's ceaseless warfare, more than anything else, forced tho Federal league leaders into a compromise with organized baseball. In more than ono way Barrow's! careor has been similar to that of Johnson. ' Both started as newspaper men. Barrow was mailing clerk on the Des Moines (Iowa) News back in 1887 and later became circulation manager. man-ager. At that time Fred olarko, former for-mer manager of the Pirates, carried papers ror him. Whilo in Des Moines Barrow organ- ized an independent ball club. Clarke, Ducky Holmes, Horman McFarland, tho old Yankee catcher and George Cross, later with Baltimore were some of his players. Ltaor Darrow wont to Pittsburg and it was horo that he joined with George Moreland and others In founding the old Interstate loague which comprised several Ohio, Pennsylvania and West Virginia towns. It was in this league that Honus Wagner played his first professional game. After this league had hit tho rocks Barrow went east and was one of tho founders of the Atlantic league, which blow up in 1899. For tho next three years Barrow managed the Toronto club of tho Eastern, now tho International Interna-tional league. In 1903 ho managed Detroit, De-troit, but was let out the next year when the club changed hands. The following year he managed Indianapolis. Indianap-olis. Roturning to Toronto the next year Barrow became dlsg-usted when his team finished last and retired from baseball unul 1910, when he accepted tho management of the Montreal club and the next year was elected president presi-dent of the leaguo. |