Shelby Blues

Professional football in Shelby, Ohio was brief but what a package of football legendary stories occurred in such a small time frame for one small-town team. Our previous two installments of this series have been dedicated to the progression and development of this squad and are somewhat a microcosm of the game of pro football itself at the dawn of the 20-century.

 We saw how the team rose as the Shelby Tube Works, transformed to the Shelby Athletic Association, and then changed their name to the Shelby Athletic Club. There were many successful campaigns in the first half dozen years or so of the organization but it was the teams after 1905 that really had some amazing runs.

The name of the Blues came about loosely because of the color of their jerseys, but right around 1905 it was becoming the proper title for the team. They were the top team in the town of Shelby at that point, heads and shoulders both literally and figuratively above the rest of the competitive teams in town. The team had a decent season in 1905 but according to the sparse records found the Blues did not have a good enough record to contend for the Ohio State title. Massillon and the Canton Athletic Clubs were the teams to beat that year. There is an interesting tidbit that we will get into more detail later, but a young player, that always wore a nose guard during game days called Jimmy Murphy joined the roster, his story gets interesting. One sad story about the team though does surface though about star player Charles Follis, from the Black History 365 site.

“Follis faced discrimination. Players on other teams targeted Follis with rough play that resulted in unnecessary injuries. At a game in Toledo in 1905, fans taunted him with racial slurs until the Toledo team captain addressed the crowd and asked them to stop. In Shelby, Follis joined his teammates at a local tavern after a game; the owner denied him entry”

 In 1906, the Shelby became a full-blown professional team. The Blues once again were in the spotlight and contending for the Ohio crown. They fell a bit short though as they were the runner-up to the state title to the Akron Indians (see out Akron Pros article). Part of the reason was the loss of Follis to injury. Charles missed the early part of the season due to a health issue, however, he did return in the second half of the season making a difference. Finally, on Thanksgiving Day 1906, while playing against the Franklin Athletic Club of Cleveland, he suffered another injury, this time it was so severe that it ended his playing career. A huge loss for the Blues and their title hopes that season.
The team seeming slipped back into mediocrity in the next few years, without their star player the Black Cyclone. But then the team put together another roster a few seasons later that would change everything once again. Remember that guy Jimmy Murphy we talked about a bit ago? Well come to find out after just a few games in 1905, the Cleveland Plain Dealer revealed that Ole Murph was really Peggy Parratt a star baseball, basketball, and football star from nearby Case University, in disguise. Soon afterward Parratt was called in for questioning by the chairman of the Case University Athletic Board, Professor Arthur S. Wright. During this investigation, it was learned, by a Parratt open admission to breaking the amateur code. The star player was then barred from all further intercollegiate play at Case and so his involvement with Shelby ended briefly as he moved on to play the rest of that year with Lorrain Ohio's club and the next year two in Massillon. According to Wikipedia:

“Parratt thus became the first college football star to be disciplined by his school for moonlighting as a professional football player. Several other college players had secretly played professional football, but they always denied the charges when questioned. However Case still awarded Peggy his varsity letter, citing his invaluable leadership on and off the field during the major part of the 1905 football season. He also made All-Ohio Honors for 1905 and was allowed to coach the college's baseball team, after being stripped of captaincy due to the scandal. After graduating from Case in 1906, Parratt was offered the head football coaching job at Marietta College, however, he turned it down to continue his professional playing career. In 1909, however, Peggy was an assistant football coach at Case, while he was also playing for the Shelby Blues.”

So Parratt’s story of returning to Shelby is a big reflection on what the Blues were doing. He returned to the Blues at some point just before the 1908 season. Peggy really committed to the squad that he played his first pro game with too as he soon became the owner of the franchise with financial investment and by helping to organize the team. He also became a player-coach for Shelby right around that time and helped the team bring in some talented players. In 1908, the team went undefeated but finished in a tie with the Akron Indians for state title claim. A year later, in 1909, the Indians and the Blues would tangle again for Ohio dominance. Akron though proved the better team that season and defeated the Blues 13-9 claiming the Ohio state championship title.
They were so close and Parratt knew it, so for the next season, Peggy went into some heavy recruiting of Ohio football players. Akron and Shelby in 1910 were still the top teams in the land, but this time the Blues overpowered their top competitor twice, in 16-6 and 8-5 victories. These wins along with the dismantling of every other opponent, helped Shelby take the State Football championship of 1910. 
The season of 1911 again saw the Shelby eleven as the team to beat. Peggy Parratt used the same plan of attack and recruited the top players for the 1911 season and once again Shelby knocked Akron twice, 6-0 and 3-0. The 1911 title game then came down to a new/old foe as the Blues were to face a revival of the Canton Bulldogs, who that season was called the Canton Professionals. A Wikipedia post helps clarify that:

“The Blues won the game when Canton forfeited the title game to Shelby, after a heated dispute over an offside ruling. According to reports, Parratt was willing to compromise with Canton over the official's call, however, Canton captain Harry Turner was so upset that he called his team off the field and refused to continue the game. Immediately after the game, Turner vowed to give up football because of the call. However, Turner wanted so badly to beat Parratt that he returned to play for Canton for the next three years.”

In 1912 Parratt left the team to work with the Akron Indians as the larger market would put more money in his pocket than Shelby could. With the departure of Parratt, it seemed the good fortunes of the Shelby Blues left with him. Oh, they competed for almost a decade later but never could they climb to the top of the pro teams to contend again. They stayed as an active participant with other teams in Ohio through the 1919 season. When most others joined the American Professional Football Association in 1920, Shelby did not but they did still play many of the newly formed Leagues member teams. Pro football was changing, and the dawning of the new era seemed to claim Shelby as one of its victims of success. In 1921 the team suspended operations. They did try to make a comeback in 1926 that lasted a few years, but the writing was truly on the wall then that football would best survive in larger markets.