14 Facts About George Sleeman

George Sleeman was a brewer, a major figure in Canadian baseball, and a politician in Ontario, Canada.

George Sleeman was mayor of Guelph from 1880 to 1882 and from 1905 to 1906.

George Sleeman's brewery sponsored an amateur baseball team called the Silver Creek Club.

The son of John H Sleeman, an immigrant from England, and Ann M Burrows, George Sleeman was born in then-Upper Canada in the village of St David's and was educated there and in Guelph.

George Sleeman fully took over the operation in 1867 when his father retired.

In 1894, George Sleeman set up the Guelph Street Railway Company, an electric streetcar company.

George Sleeman invested so much of his own money in the operation that by 1902 the banks took over his house, railway and his brewery.

George Sleeman retired from the family business in 1905 and died in Guelph in 1926 at the age of 85 after undergoing an operation for an obstructed bowel.

George Sleeman had been a pitcher for the Guelph Maple Leafs baseball club and later became the team's financial backer.

George Sleeman was the first team manager to import American players; at first, he paid them a share of the profits, but later he paid his players salaries.

George Sleeman encouraged other teams to do so in the new Canadian Association of Base Ball Players, of which he was president.

In 1869, the Leafs squad won the Canadian championship and George Sleeman was named president of the club.

In 1877, George Sleeman helped establish the International Association as a competitor to the National League.

George Sleeman was inducted into the Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame in 1999.