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Clarence Charles “Pint” Isreal was Rockville’s very own baseball star and Negro World Series champion.
Born in Marietta, Georgia, on February 15, 1918, Clarence Isreal grew up in Lincoln Park. After graduating from Lincoln High School in 1935, “Pint” signed with the Washington Royals, a semi-pro barnstorming team.
In 1940, Isreal joined the Newark Eagles team of the Negro National League. At second base, he was a hustler, a good fielder with good speed. From 1943 to 1945, he played third base for the powerhouse Homestead Grays. The Grays played their home games at both Forbes Field in Pittsburgh and Griffith Stadium in Washington during World War II, when the white major league teams were on the road. They won the National League pennant every year from 1939 to 1945.
After a stint in the military, Isreal resumed his career with the Eagles in 1946. That season, the team won the Negro National League pennant. In the World Series against the Kansas City Monarchs, “Pint” started at third base in three games and had a pinch-hit single off the legendary Satchel Paige, helping to clinch the championship.
Isreal signed with the Homestead Grays again in 1947, where his teammates included Hall of Famers Josh Gibson, Bucky Leonard, and Cool Papa Bell.
The following year, having retired from baseball, Isreal took a job as a technician at the National Institutes of Health, where he worked until 1973. But “Pint” continued to play ball, manage teams, and umpire games. In the late forties, he and his brothers Elbert and Dewey played locally on a team called the Legionaires. Elbert Isreal went on to play infield for the Philadelphia Stars of the Negro American League in 1950.
In his community, “Pint” Isreal was known as a humanitarian and active church member. He served the youth of Lincoln Park as co-founder of the Black Angels Boys Club.
Clarence Isreal died on April 12, 1987. In Lincoln Park, he is well remembered and has been memorialized by the City of Rockville, which named a park with a ball field in his honor.
To view enlarged images, click on the pictures below.
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