baseball player manager club owner
Griffith was born on November 20, 1869 in Clear Creek, Missouri, the son of Isaiah and Sarah Ann Wright Griffith. His father, a farmer who supplemented his income by hunting and trapping, was killed in a hunting accident when Clark Griffith was two years old.
Griffith attended Stringtown, Missouri, public school until he was thirteen; then the family moved to Normal, Illinois, where his mother opened a boardinghouse.
Griffith took his first baseball job at age eleven, as bat boy for the Stringtown team. When he was eighteen the Hoopeston, Illinois, club offered him $10 to pitch against a team from Danville, Illinois. In 1888 he entered organized baseball when he joined the Bloomington, Illinois, club of the Inter-State League. His success there led to his purchase by the strong minor-league Milwaukee team, with which he signed a contract for $225 a month. He became the leading Milwaukee pitcher, but late in the 1890 season he broke his contract to join the St. Louis Browns of the American Association, then a major league. After the American Association dissolved, Griffith drifted among several minor-league teams and an "outlaw" team before returning to major-league baseball with the Chicago National League team late in 1893. In the next seven seasons he won 151 games and lost only ninety-four. Breaking his contract with the National League Chicago Colts, Griffith helped Ban Johnson and Charles Comiskey launch the American League of Professional Baseball Clubs in 1901, and induced National League players to violate their contracts and join teams of the rival organization. As player-manager of the Chicago White Sox that season, he led the team to the first American League championship, contributing twenty-four pitching victories, against only eight losses. In 1903 he was chosen the first manager of the New York American League team, the Highlanders, later known as the Yankees, but when the Yankees did poorly during the 1908 season, he quit the team and the following year became player-manager of the Cincinnati Reds. Griffith never felt at home in the National League, however, for its club owners resented his earlier raids on their teams; in 1912 he secured a job as player-manager of the Washington American League team. To assure his tenure he purchased a 10 percent interest, thereby becoming the club's largest stockholder. He ended his playing days in 1914 with a career pitching total of 236 wins and 139 losses - a winning percentage of . 629. In achieving this record he relied on control and craft to compensate for lack of speed, thus earning the nickname "The Old Fox. " In 1919 Griffith obtained a bank loan and, with William Richardson, a Philadelphia grain dealer and exporter, purchased controlling interest in the Washington American League club. Although they divided their stock in the club evenly, Richardson gave full control of his shares to Griffith, who became president and continued to manage the team, the Washington Senators, during the 1920 season. Under Griffith's ownership Washington won three American League pennants. His biggest triumph came in 1924, when the club won both its first pennant and the world championship, defeating the New York Giants in seven games. Despite generally poor attendance Griffith managed to make a profit most years by keeping expenditures for player procurement and salaries low, renting the stadium to football and black baseball teams, and selling radio and television rights. Griffith made several other important contributions to baseball. He prevailed upon President William Howard Taft to throw out the first ball at the opening game of the 1912 season, a ritual since followed by most presidents, that symbolized official recognition of baseball as the national game. Griffith later persuaded government officials to ease restrictions on baseball during both world wars. He died in Washington, D. C. on October 27, 1955. Upon his death his adopted son Calvin assumed control of the Washington club.
Griffith is best known as manager of the Cincinnati Reds (1909-1911) and later Washington Senators (1912-1920). Sometimes known for being a thrifty executive, Griffith is also remembered for attracting talented players from the National League to play for the Senators when the American League was in its infancy.
On December 2, 1900, Griffith married Ann Robertson. They had no children, but Griffith supported his wife's six nieces and nephews after his brother-in-law died, adopting two of the children.
