Lawrence A. Bucynski Baseball Correspondence

Collection

Identifier: MSSP_10141

Staff Only
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Content Description

Lawrence A. Bucynski Baseball Correspondence includes nine pieces of correspondence from the summer of 1949 between baseball player Lawrence Bucynski, George Trautman, the President of the National Association of Professional Baseball Clubs, and the Abbeville (Louisiana) Athletics of the minor Evangeline League. The letters discuss a salary dispute between Bucynski and the Abbeville baseball team. Formats include letters and telegrams.

Dates

Creation: May 25, 1949 - August 20, 1949

Creator

Bucynski, Lawrence A. (Lawrence Anthony), 1921-1996 (Person)
Trautman, George M. (Person)
Abbeville Athletics (Baseball team) (Organization)

Conditions Governing Access

There are no access restrictions on this collection.

Conditions Governing Use

Copyright status for collection materials is unknown. Transmission or reproduction of materials protected by U.S. Copyright Law (Title 17, U.S.C.) beyond that allowed by fair use requires the written permission of the copyright owners. Works not in the public domain cannot be commercially exploited without permission of the copyright owners. Responsibility for any use rests exclusively with the user.

Biographical / Historical

On April 26, 1949, while playing in his ninth game of the year for the Abbeville (Louisiana) Athletics of the minor Evangeline League, baseball player Lawrence A. Bucynski suffered a season-ending injury when he fractured his kneecap. The Abbeville franchise placed him on the disabled list on May 3rd and granted him his unconditional release on May 24th. Bucynksi received his full salary from Abbeville for 13 days, and the letters detail his attempts to receive additional compensation from Abbeville. Bucynski complained about the money he felt he was owed to George Trautman, the President of the National Association of Professional Baseball League, the governing body of baseball’s official minor leagues.

Trautman gathered information from both parties. I.M. Goldberg, President of the Abbeville team, claimed that Bucynski was drawing workmen’s compensation from the team’s Insurance company and that Bucynski owed the team money from a cash advance during spring training. Trautman ruled that Abbeville owed Bucysnki his full contractual salary through the date of his release minus any workman’s compensation payments. Bucysnki felt that he was additionally owed two weeks of severance pay after his release.

The letters document aspects of the economics of minor league baseball, and the sometimes precarious financial situation of both minor league baseball players and minor league baseball teams during the middle of the twentieth century.

Lawrence Bucynski was born in Lilly, Pennsylvania, in 1921, and he played professional minor league baseball from 1946 to 1955. He died in Altoona, Pennsylvania in 1996.

For more information about Lawrence Bucynski’s baseball career, see: Lawrence Bucynski Sporting News Player Contract Card hosted by the LA84 Foundation Digital Library (https://digital.la84.org/digital/collection/p17103coll3/id/7446)