Red Bluhm

Harvey Fred Bluhm

• Bats Right, Throws Right
• Height 5' 11", Weight 165 lb.

• Debut July 3, 1918
• Final Game July 3, 1918
• Born June 27, 1894 in Cleveland, OH USA
• Died May 7, 1952 in Flint, MI USA

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Biographical Information

Red Bluhm received his one major league at-bat with the Boston Red Sox as a pinch-hitter on July 3, 1918, popping out to first base batting for pitcher Lore Bader in a 6-0 loss to the Philadelphia Athletics on July 3rd. He was then slated to start a game at first base, in place of the injured Stuffy McInnis, on July 9th, but pitcher Babe Ruth convinced manager Ed Barrow to let him play there instead. Ruth had already played a couple of games in the field earlier in the season, and would soon become a full-time two-way player. For Bluhm, his only opportunity to start a game in the majors vanished. The Sox went on to win the 1918 World Series, but Bluhm was long gone from the team by then.

Red had been playing first base for the New Orleans Pelicans of the Southern Association at the start of the 1918 season, but a couple of days before the league ceased operations on June 28th on account of World War I, Pelicans president A.J. Heinemann sold three of his players to Boston: Bluhm, Walter Barbare and Jack Stansbury. On July 19th, he was optioned to the Jersey City Skeeters of the International League, having spent the remainder of his three weeks with the Sox sitting on the bench. Bluhm almost became a "lost player", though. The official scorer for the game he played in had not included his name on his scorecard, and it was only in 1962 that he was added to official records. It took an article by Hall of Fame historian Lee Allen in the Sporting News to do so; Allen had heard about this mystery player and appealed to readers for documentation. His presence in the game was confirmed by contemporary newspaper reports and boxscores.

His biography appears in the book When Boston Still Had the Babe.

Related Sites

• Red Bluhm at the SABR Bio Project