Like John Bradley and George Kittle, Henry Fabian was a member of the 1888 Dallas Hams, champions of the Texas League and the Texas Southern League. Unlike those two, when someone fired a shot at him he missed.
Fabian was born in New Orleans, in 1864 or 1866, depending on the source. He began his career in 1886, catching and playing first base for both of his hometown teams in the four-team Gulf League: the Robert E. Lee’s and the team that became the New Orleans Pelicans.
Fabian had his fingers broken by a foul tip before the beginning of the season. A 1913 article by former Major Leaguer turned sportswriter Sam Crane told the story:
“It was such a serious injury that there was no possibility of his playing again that season and rather than release him his manager (Thomas Brennan) asked him to become groundskeeper at the same salary he was getting as a player.”
That experience would stay with him.
By November of 1887 he had recovered enough to play in games against the Chicago White Stockings and Saint Louis Browns when their post-season barnstorming tour stopped in New Orleans.
In 1888 Fabian came to Texas as a member of the Galveston Giants, but was with Dallas by June. While statistics are spotty for his career, and non-existent for 1888, The Dallas Morning News said of him:
“Though not a brilliant player, Henry has always been a hardworking courageous one.”
Fabian continued playing until 1903, spending his entire career in Texas and Louisiana with the exception of 1891 when he played for the Cedar Rapids Canaries in the Illinois-Iowa League where he played with John McGraw, who became one of his closest friends.
Fabian was the subject of two strange stories. In a July 1892 a headline in The Dallas Morning News said:
“Henry Fabian Shot At. A Case in Which a Base Ball Man Dodged a Bullet.”
The story said a local carpenter named Parker had fired a shot at Fabian. Fabian told a reporter for the paper that “an article appeared in The Kansas City Sun about which he wanted an explanation from Parker.” The article said “Mr. Fabian’s description of the article The News is not privileged to report at this stage of the proceedings.”
There was never another reference in any Dallas paper to the incident or about what the Kansas City story might have been.
Henry Fabian, circa 1930
In 1904 an Associated Press article appeared in several newspapers under the headline “Joy Restores Her Sight:”
“Sight has been miraculously restored to the stone-blind eyes of an aged mother by the voice of her son who returned unheralded after an absence of 18 years. The woman is Mrs. Sophie Fabian of New Orleans and the son is Henry.”
The rest of the story did not completely live up to the headline or lede; Mrs. Fabian was told her sight might come back and the story conceded “the recovery was not complete,” but nonetheless, the paper’s treated it as some kind of miracle
Fabian returned to baseball in 1905 as part owner and president of the Waco Tigers in the Texas League, and while there he was the catalyst for changing a Texas law that helped make Texas League baseball profitable.
That, and Fabian’s other claims to fame, tomorrow.
Baseball History Daily 