Women’s Equality Day: The Women of the Indianapolis Clowns

Many moons ago, Victory Field sat at the corner of West 16th and Harding Streets in Indianapolis. It’s a short drive from the current era of Indians baseball, just follow the river along its west edge and cross at the 16th Street bridge.

You can still peek through the wrought iron fence to see the remnants of a ballpark that once was the home of history. Bush Stadium later reopened as an apartment complex named “Stadium Lofts” in July 2013, just over 17 years since the Indians last took the field there in July 1996. But forget about the tenants who live there now, and instead peer through the columns that separate the memories of champions from the outside world, and look toward the right side of the infield, between first and second base.

That’s the spot where two ballplayers – one current Indianapolis Clown, one former – dug their cleats into the dirt during the Clowns’ 1954 home opener. The importance? They were women.

Only three women played throughout the entire history of the Negro Leagues. All of their careers went through Indianapolis on that 1954 day – June 10, to be exact – at Victory Field.

Toni Stone, the first woman to regularly play professional baseball on a major league team, began her big-league career in the Circle City the year prior. She hit .243 with the Clowns, not counting a single she hit off a Satchel Paige fastball during an exhibition game, and was a dart on the bases. Stone could run 100 yards in 11 seconds according to her Britannica biography, meaning she could make it 90 feet down the basepaths in just 3.3 seconds. For context, the average speed from home to first in MLB for 2020 is 4.2-4.3 seconds.

After 50 games in Indianapolis, she was traded to the Kansas City Monarchs in 1954 and made her return to Indy on June 10, suiting up as one of the two female players at second base in the game. She retired following the season.

Constance “Connie” Morgan followed Stone on the Clowns, signed to a two-year contract to offset the trade to Kansas City. She was known as a weapon at the plate, entering her Negro Leagues career with a .368 average in five seasons for the North Philadelphia Honey Drippers, an all-female team.

A 19-year-old Philly native at 5-foot-4, 140 pounds, Morgan dazzled in her debut. In an Opening Day doubleheader, she “went far to her right to make a sensational stop, flipped to shortstop Bill Holder and started a lightning double play against the Birmingham Barons,” according to a May 29 issue of The Baltimore Afro-American. Less than two weeks later, she made her Victory Field debut at second base for the Clowns, opposite Stone.

Mamie “Peanut” Johnson, although it’s not documented whether she appeared in that June 10 home opener for the Clowns or not, played with both Stone and Morgan as a member of the Clowns from 1953-55. At 18 years old, she was the only woman to take the mound as a major league pitcher in the Negro Leagues.

Instead of being granted a tryout by the World War II-era All-American Girls Professional Baseball League on the basis of race, the Indianapolis Clowns reached out to her instead.

Johnson, like Morgan, made an impression in her debut. According to Baseball Reference, she struck out Hank Baylis after he yelled “What makes you think you can strike a batter out? Why, you aren’t any larger than a peanut!”

The nickname stuck. Peanut Johnson went on to a 33-8 record throughout her career and hit .276 before retiring at the end of the 1955 season.

Stone and Morgan died in 1997, and Johnson in 2017. Their history both in Indianapolis and baseball lives on as the world looks back on the 100-year anniversary of the Negro Leagues.