Homestead Grays were a professional baseball team that played in the Negro leagues of the United States from 1929 to 1949. The Negro leagues were for Black players, who were barred from playing alongside white players because of racial segregation . The Grays were originally based in Homestead, Pennsylvania , near Pittsburgh . They played many home games at Pittsburgh’s Forbes Field, which the team shared with the Pittsburgh Pirates of Major League Baseball (MLB). The Grays also played many home games in Washington, D.C. , where the team shared Griffith Stadium with MLB’s Washington Senators .
The Grays began as an independent Black team in 1912, owned by the former outfielder Cumberland Posey. They were a “barnstorming” ball club, playing games when and where they could, and they dominated most opponents. In 1929, the team played in the professional American Negro League, the only season the league existed. They then returned to barnstorming. The Grays’ success on the field attracted the catcher Josh Gibson and other star players to the team. In 1932, the Grays were part of the short-lived East-West League. In 1935, the team entered the elite Negro National League (NNL). Featuring the slugging first baseman Buck Leonard and the pitcher Ray Brown, the Grays won NNL titles in 1937, 1938, and 1939. Posey, Gibson, Leonard, Brown, and the early Grays pitcher Smokey Joe Williams were all later elected to the National Baseball Hall of Fame .
In 1940, the team began splitting home games between Pittsburgh and Washington, D.C. The Grays continued winning, taking NNL titles every year from 1940 to 1945 and again in 1948. The team also won the Negro World Series—which was played against the champions of the rival Negro American League—in 1943, 1944, and 1948. Grays stars of the 1940’s included Brown, Gibson, Leonard, and eventual Hall of Famers Cool Papa Bell and Jud Wilson.
After the integration of Major League Baseball in 1947, MLB teams signed star players from the Negro leagues, sending many Black teams into decline. The NNL folded after the 1948 season, and the Grays briefly joined the Negro American Association in 1949. The Grays played their final games in 1950 as an independent team.
