Harry Herbert Frazee was an American theatrical agent, producer, and director, and owner of Major League Baseball's Boston Red Sox from 1916 to 1923.
26 Facts About Harry Frazee
2.
Harry Frazee is well known for selling Babe Ruth to the New York Yankees, which started the alleged Curse of the Bambino.
3.
Harry Frazee was born June 29,1880, in Peoria, Illinois, son of William and Margaret Frazee.
4.
Harry Frazee attended Peoria High School, where he was a baseball teammate of Harry Bay, who later played for Major League Baseball teams in Cincinnati and Cleveland.
5.
At 16, Frazee became assistant manager of the Peoria Theater.
6.
Harry Frazee promoted a boxing match between Jess Willard and Jack Johnson on April 5,1915 in Havana, Cuba and was reported by then to be a millionaire.
7.
Harry Frazee bought the Boston Red Sox baseball team from Joseph Lannin for a reported $675,000 after their victory in the 1916 World Series.
8.
Harry Frazee then left the Red Sox in bankruptcy while continuing to produce theatre shows.
9.
Harry Frazee backed a number of New York theatrical productions, the best-known of which is probably No, No, Nanette, which was once claimed, and later debunked, as the specific play that Ruth's sale financed.
10.
Harry Frazee was the subject of an unflattering portrait in Fred Lieb's account of the Red Sox, which further insinuated that he had sold Ruth to finance a Broadway musical.
11.
Harry Frazee was the first American League owner who Johnson had not essentially hand-picked, and was unwilling to simply do Johnson's bidding.
12.
Harry Frazee often found himself having to borrow from the Red Sox to meet his other commitments.
13.
Johnson ordered him suspended, but Harry Frazee instead sold him to the then-moribund Yankees.
14.
Under the circumstances, when Harry Frazee finally lost patience with Ruth, his options were severely limited.
15.
In effect, Johnson limited Harry Frazee to dealing with either the White Sox or the Yankees.
16.
When Harry Frazee bought the Red Sox, Fenway Park was not part of the deal.
17.
However, Harry Frazee had stopped paying installments because of a dispute over who owed Boston's share of MLB's settlement with the Federal League.
18.
Lannin threatened to sell his interest in the Fenway Realty Trust, which would have opened the door for a new owner to buy into the park if Harry Frazee lost the franchise.
19.
Harry Frazee had every intention of using the money from the Ruth deal to get better players.
20.
Harry Frazee was thus forced to put the team's best players on the market in order to get cash.
21.
The above only includes the trades Harry Frazee made to the Yankees from 1918 to 1923, when he was owner of the Red Sox.
22.
In 1921, an article in the Dearborn Independent claimed that Harry Frazee was one of many Jews who had ruined baseball.
23.
Harry Frazee was unable to respond, since at the time it was published he was not only dealing with a divorce, but the death of his father.
24.
The article wrecked any chance Harry Frazee had of rehabilitating himself.
25.
In 1929, Harry Frazee died of kidney failure in his Park Avenue home with his wife and son at his side.
26.
Harry Frazee wanted to trade Ruth to the White Sox for Jackson, but the Black Sox Scandal scuttled those plans.