In 1900, The Brooklyn Eagle used the example of pitcher Gus Weyhing running afoul of a New York brewery by vandalizing the ceiling fresco as an example of how in the “old days” when baseball was “in its prime,” such incidents were covered up.
The incident was actually covered quite extensively in the press and resulted in an elaborate practical joke played on Weyhing—which received extensive coverage as well—and the prank caused Weyhing more trouble.
Weyhing
Shortly after the end of the 1890 season—on October 10–Weyhing, who led Wards Wonders to a second-place finish in the Players League—winning 30 games—was with several friends at the Piel Brothers Brewery on Sheffield Avenue in Brooklyn.
The Brooklyn Times said Weyhing engaged in “malicious mischief,” at the brewery.
The Pittsburgh Post described the “mischief,” after Weyhing and his party:
“(W)ere served with numerous sandwiches and plenty of beer. In the course of time they became very frolicsome. Weyhing took several slices of bread, which he plastered over with thick coatings of butter and mustard. Then he bet that he could make them stick to the ceiling.”
According to the paper, Weyhing was successful and:
“One slice covered the nose of a frescoes figure of King Gambrinus. Another covered over his glass of foaming beer, and another hit his Schuetzen Corps medal. Weyhing and his friends laughed boisterously at the joke, and then departed.”
The Times said Piel’s Brewery had become “a favorite resort for Captain Johnny Ward’s ball players ever since the opening on the Players’ League ballpark.”
Weyhing had been there that day with “a half dozen of his brother leaguers” and “a well-known official under the local government.”
The Brooklyn Eagle said Brooklyn catcher Tom Kinslow had been present “and thought it a huge joke.”
And, said The Eagle, it was Kinslow who was behind a prank played on Weyhing:
Kinslow, accompanied by a detective friend, approached Weyhing at another bar. Weyhing was “served” by the detective with the fake subpoena and Kinslow and the other members of the party told him they had been served as well:
“’You’ve got us all in a nice box,’ said Kinslow.”
The detective told Weyhing he was being placed under arrest. Weyhing said he could not go to jail and his friends suggested he go see a friend at a bar “on the corner of Atlantic and Alabama Avenues” in Brooklyn to borrow bail money.
The pitcher, accompanied by the detective and Kinslow went to the bar; there all the other members of the original party were gathered and suggested that they summon a former judge to help Weyhing—he appeared along with another friend of the group who worked for the district attorney:
“The (attorney) began to score the pitcher for the trouble he had got them into and talked to him for fully half an hour.
“Poor Weyhing sat at a table, with his head in his hands, and said not a word while the (attorney) was talking. Then he raised his face and said in a husky voice:
“’I’ll pay whatever damage was done, for heaven’s sake, let up.’” But he wouldn’t let up. He took particular pains to let Mr. Weyhing know that the punishment for his crime was a year’s imprisonment in the penitentiary.”
The Eagle said “the fun continued” until Weyhing “was about $10 poorer” buying drinks to calm everyone’s nerves—at that point he was told it was joke:
“Unfortunately for Mr. Weyhing some outsider enjoyed the joke and quietly related the proceedings to Mr. Piel. Thus it was that the warrant was procured for Weyhing’s arrest.”
With a real warrant issued, he left town and spent the winter at home in Louisville.
Weyhing had jumped the Philadelphia Athletics to join Brooklyn in 1890 and was returned to the American Association club for the 1891 season.
On April 22, he was on board the New Haven Railroad traveling from Boston to Washington. A New York police officer:
“Received word that the train on which Weyhing was a passenger would reach the New Haven depot, on the Harlem.”
He was taken into custody and “occupied a cell” in the tenth precinct jail for several hours.
The Eagle said, Weyhing appeared before judge, “refused to make a statement,” and a “well known sporting man” posted $500 bail.
At this point, it appears the dispute was settled with no further legal action. The Citizen said the case was being presented to a grand jury, but there is no record of an indictment or any further legal proceeding in the case, so The Eagle’s statement, ten years later, was partially true it appears. The incident itself was not swept under the rug and received extensive coverage, but once he posted bail, there were no public consequences for Weyhing.
He had one more bizarre brush with the law the following season. Weyhing, along with his former teammate Lave Cross, collected and bred pigeons. The Boston Post said:
“(They) are pigeon fanciers. They have great collections of fantails, carriers, and pouters, and exhibit at many shows.”
The Louisville Courier-Journal said Weyhing was attending a pigeon show when he was found to have in his possession “two very fine Blondinottes, valued at $50 each.” The paper said Weyhing had the birds in a basket with his other pigeons as he was leaving the show.
Weyhing was taken to a jail in Louisville where he initially “gave his name as William Joyce,” and was charged with grand larceny.
The Philadelphia Times said of Weyhing, who won 31 games for the Athletics in the final season of the American Association, and would pitch for the Phillies in the National League in 1892, said of the arrest:
“Weyhing has a weakness for fine pigeons…It does not however, seem possible that a man in Weyhing’s position, and with such an income as he enjoys, would be guilty of such a deed over a couple of birds. Weyhing has in the past been in trouble through indiscretion, but nothing more serious than conviviality, and consequent excess, was ever charged against him.”
The Philadelphia paper said it would be “a hard blow” to to the Phillies if he were found guilty, but if he was “the club, of course, could not afford to keep him.”
He was held for trial and appeared in court on January 30. The Courier-Journal said:
“Weyhing was acquitted of the pigeon-stealing charge in the City Court. The prosecuting witness was absent, but judge Thompson heard other witnesses and honorably discharged Weyhing.”
Weyhing won 32 games for the Phillies in 1892, and appears to have stayed out of trouble for the remainder of his life.
He worked as a doorman at a theater and night watchman at the Louisville Water Company. He died in 1955.
Weyhing 1950s
The Courier-Journal said in his obituary:
“He had never known a sore arm during his 15 years of top-flight pitching.”
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