Arnold Johnson
From BR Bullpen
Arnold M. Johnson
- School University of Chicago
- Born 1906 in Chicago, IL USA
- Died March 10, 1960 in West Palm Beach, FL USA
[edit] Biographical Information
Arnold Johnson purchased the Philadelphia Athletics from Connie Mack's family in 1954 and moved them to Kansas City the following season. Arnold and his brother, Earl Johnson, were co-owners of the A's from 1954 to 1961, when they sold the team to Charlie Finley.
Johnson was a rich businessman from Chicago who, among other interests, was the owner of Yankee Stadium and of Kansas City's Blues Stadium, where the New York Yankees' top farm team, the Kansas City Blues played their games. He was also a part-owner of the Chicago Black Hawks of the National Hockey League. Johnson's bid for the Athletics almost wasn't successful. Roy Mack, acting on behalf of his father, had accepted a deal to sell the team to a group of local Philadelphia businessmen. Johnson stepped in by offering more money and promising Roy a senior executive position with his team. Roy decided to vote against the sale to the Philadelphia interests when the deal was presented to American League owners, nominally on his behalf, and when the AL owners failed to approve the sale, worked out a deal with Johnson. This time, the AL owners approved the sale, encouraged by Yankees President Dan Topping, who was very happy to see a close associate of his team become a co-owner. The sale was approved, Roy was given a Vice-President position with no power (and Connie Mack himself became an equally meaningless Honorary President), and the Athletics were free to move to the Midwest.
Johnson's ownership of the Athletics was not a period of renaissance, far from it. He had been forced to relinquish his interests in Yankee Stadium, but he seemed to be more bent in operating his new team as a major-league farm team of the Yankees than as an American League rival. The Yankees did not ask for concessions in return from losing their Kansas City farm club, but what they received instead was Johnson's unfailing cooperation in various one-sided trades by which the Yankees dumped unwanted washed up veterans on the Athletics, in return for top prospects, or even instances where the Athletics signed amateur players to large bonuses, kept them on their major league roster for the mandatory period imposed by the bonus rule, and then handed them over to New York when they were ready to contribute (Clete Boyer was the most famous case). The Athletics never threatened to play even .500 ball during their time in Kansas City, and were just as awful as they had been during the Macks' last years in Philadelphia when Johnson died suddenly while attending spring training in 1960. His heirs quickly sold the team to Charlie Finley after that.
[edit] Further Reading
- Robert D. Warrington: "Departure Without Dignity: The Athletics Leave Philadelphia", The Baseball Research Journal, SABR, Vol. 39, Number 2 (Fall 2010), pp. 95-115.
