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George Leclair |
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George Leclair bio |
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Yves
Chartrand |
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Like fellow Vermont native Jean
Dubuc, George Leclair was a
right-handed pitcher of
French-Canadian descent. The two
were actually teammates for a
short time with the Montreal
Royals, but Leclair lacked
Dubuc's obvious talent, and his
life was not destined for the
long and interestingly varied
flavor of his teammate's.
Following three mediocre minor
league seasons, George pitched
in a short-lived third major
league known as the Federal
League, compiling a 7-12 record
and 3.36 ERA during its only two
years of existence. After three
more seasons in the minors,
Leclair returned to Quebec.
There a flu epidemic snuffed out
his short life before his 32nd
birthday.
According to Total Baseball,
George Lewis "Frenchy" LaClaire
was born in Milton, Vermont, on
October 18, 1886. The spelling
of his last name appears to be
an anglicization of the common
French name Leclair; George
himself preferred the French
spelling, and that is what
appears on his tombstone at the
St. Romuald Roman Catholic
Cemetery in Farnham, Quebec.
There is also some question
whether the pitcher actually was
born in the northwestern Vermont
village of Milton. No birth
certificate exists, and there is
no record of his baptism at the
Catholic church in Milton or in
any of the neighboring parishes.
Apparently the only evidence is
a form filled out around 1914
and contained in Leclair's file
at the National Baseball
Library. In his own hand he
listed Milton as his birthplace.
By the time of George's tenth
birthday his family was living
in Farnham, not far from the
Vermont border. According to
local historian Alban Berthiaume,
Leclair's parents, Louis Leclair
and Emelie Pelletier, operated a
shoestore. Next to nothing is
known about young George's
childhood. In fact, the first we
know anything about him is when
he emerged as a young baseball
star.
On Opening Day of the
independent Eastern Canada
League's 1906 season, George
pitched Farnham to a 9-2
victory. Two weeks later he
recorded 16 strikeouts in a 5-4
win over St. Jean. After the
season Leclair married Annie
Choquette, the sister of the
Farnham team's manager.
In his five seasons with
Farnham, George Leclair pitched
well enough to earn his first
shot at organized baseball in
the fall of 1910. He even signed
a major-league contract that
fall, and the man who made that
possible was Larry Gardner. The
two Vermonters had met while
playing together on the Farnham
team during the summer of 1906.
After the Boston Red Sox played
an exhibition game in Burlington
on October 10, 1910, manager
Patsy Donovan announced that he
was signing a local player on
Gardner's recommendation. "The
new man is George L. LeClair,"
the Burlington Free Press
reported, "a native of Farnham,
P.Q., who did the twirling at
some hard games for Montreal
during the past season."
Actually Leclair had pitched in
only a single game for Montreal.
On the last weekend of the 1910
season, he started the second
game of a doubleheader against
Rochester, champions of the
Eastern League. After striking
out the leadoff man, a nervous
Leclair was hit hard by four
consecutive batters, resulting
in two runs. He regained his
composure, however, and allowed
only two hits over the next four
innings. The Royals scored once
in the bottom of the first and
four times in the fourth to give
Leclair a rain-shortened 5-2
victory in his professional
debut.
Whatever happened to George
Leclair's contract with the
Boston Red Sox remains a
mystery. On March 27, 1911, he
arrived at spring training with
the Montreal Royals in Newport
News, Virginia. Accompanying
Leclair was Jean Dubuc, who had
been retained as special
correspondent by La Presse,
one of Montreal's
French-language daily
newspapers.
On April 1, Leclair pitched six
strong innings for the regulars
in a 9-1 victory over the
rookies. Playing right field for
the rookies, Dubuc picked up two
of his team's four hits but was
still impressed by the
Vermonter's performance. "Leclair
is making a very good
impression," he wrote in La
Presse. "He just has to keep
going to secure a place on the
team."
Apparently Leclair kept going
because he was one of Montreal's
six pitchers when the regular
season opened on April 21. But
he did not pitch until the ninth
game of the season, when La
Presse reported that he was
the only hurler to do well in a
6-3 loss to Jersey City. Over
the course of the 1911 season,
Leclair pitched in only ten
games for the Royals, pitching
29.1 innings.
Montreal invited him to spring
training again in 1912, and
again he made the team. But
before the season was a month
old the Royals shipped Leclair
to Bridgeport of the Class-B
Connecticut League. The
following year Montreal released
him after only one spring
training appearance.
Leclair spent the 1913 season
with LaCrosse, Wisconsin, of the
Class-C Northern League. He
finished with the league's worst
winning percentage, prevailing
in just two of his 16 decisions
and yielding 161 hits in 133
innings. His career in baseball
appeared to be headed downward
-- yet days in the big leagues
were just around the corner.
After operating as a minor
league the previous season,
Federal League owners decided to
compete with the two existing
major leagues in 1914. To
bolster their credibility they
signed a number of established
major leaguers. George Leclair's
teammates on the 1914 Pittsburgh
Stogies, for example, included
Rebel Oakes, formerly of the
Cardinals; ex-Tiger Davy Jones;
and Howie Camnitz, a former
Pirate. Still, that Leclair
could make a Federal League
roster may say more about the
circuit's quality of play than
the quality of his pitching.
The Milton native signed with
Pittsburgh in April but did not
make his major-league debut
until June 5, 1914. The Stogies
were already down 6-0 to the
Baltimore Terrapins that day
when he entered in the fifth
inning. The game ended as a 14-3
Baltimore rout, with George
finishing out the massacre. It
was a typical game for the
Stogies, who finished seventh in
an eight-team race. Leclair
fared better than his teammates,
compiling a 5-2 record in 22
games, mostly in relief.
George saw several new faces
when he returned to Pittsburgh
in 1915. Over the winter the
Stogies had stolen the crosstown
Pirates' corner infielders,
slugging first baseman Ed
Konetchy and slick-fielding
third baseman Mike Mowrey. Even
though Pittsburgh improved to
second place that season,
Leclair's record actually
suffered; he was only 1-2 when
the Buffeds acquired him in late
June.
In Buffalo Leclair joined Bob
Smith, the only other Vermonter
to throw in with the Feds, but
the two were teammates for less
than a month when George was
dispatched to the last place
Terrapins. Wearing the uniform
of his third Federal League team
of the season, Leclair actually
pitched much better for
Baltimore than his dismal 1-8
record reflects. For the entire
1915 season, he pitched in 33
games, gave up 123 hits in 132.2
innings and finished with a 2.85
ERA.
The demise of the Federal League
after the 1915 season meant the
end of George Leclair's career
as a major leaguer. In the Feds'
peace settlement with the
traditional circuits, Leclair's
rights went to the American
League's St. Louis Browns.
The Browns assigned Leclair to
Little Rock of the Southern
Association to begin the 1916
season, but he pitched poorly in
his infrequent appearances. In
September he was demoted to
Peoria of the Class-B Three-I
League. George was pitching well
as a regular starter for Peoria
in 1917 when World War I caused
the Three-I League to disband on
July 8. His performance slipped
somewhat after Peoria
transferred to the Central
League. Still, when Leclair
returned to Farnham to pitch in
a postseason exhibition, La
Presse reported that he had won
both ends of three doubleheaders
that summer and several
International League teams were
interested in his services.
After pitching for Elmira of the
New York State League in 1918,
Leclair returned to Farnham in
the offseason and found work
with the Canadian Pacific
Railways. He died suddenly on
October 14, four days short of
his 32nd birthday, a victim of
the Spanish Flu. Contrary to
reports, the flu epidemic did
not wipe out Leclair's entire
family. In fact, George's wife
gave birth to a daughter seven
months after his death, and his
namesake grandson, Georges
Leclair III, lived in Iberville,
Quebec as of 2000.
Sources
A version of this biography
originally appeared in Green
Mountain Boys of Summer:
Vermonters in the Major Leagues
1882-1993, edited by Tom
Simon (New England Press, 2000).
In researching this article, the
author made use of the subject's
file at the National Baseball
Hall of Fame Library and various
local newspapers.
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statistiques comprennent seulement les matchs pour
lesquels nous avons les sommaires. Only games with
boxscores are included in individual stats. Recherche:
Alexandre Pratt. Sources: La Patrie et La Presse... |
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