I am a member of the Village of Fairview Historical Society. We often get requests from other researchers for local Detroit history. This one has me stumped. Mack Park was venue for the National Negro League. I wrote a short blurb for a local non profit newletter which I will include here. The researcher is a faculty member of an esteemed College. Anyone have thought or memories to share?

Mack Park
Home to the Detroit Stars

The Detroit Stars were formed in 1910 as a Detroit Negro baseball team. The owner of the baseball team was John Roesink a Jewish businessman, originally from Grand Rapids, who owned several haberdashery stores in and near downtown. In 1914, Roesink built a baseball stadium for his team named simply ” Mack Park” with seating for 6,000, located in what was then called German Town. The location of the park was at the southeast corner of Fairview and Mack.

Prior to and after the creation of the Negro National League, Negro teams played each other and also played Caucasian major league teams which would schedule exhibition games on their teams day off to create additional revenue for their players. The establishment of a major league players union and the fact that Caucasian major league players disliked being bested by Negro teams stopped this practice.

On a good day, Mack Park out drew Briggs [[Tiger) Stadium with an integrated crowd. During World War I, Roesink booked the Boston Braves, the Brooklyn Dodgers and other Pro teams to play his semi-pro Negro team.

In 1919, Rube Foster, a black sports promoter, created the Negro National League.
The semi-pro Negro National League was well organized. There were two leagues, a 140 game schedule, an all-star game every year in Chicago and a world series at the end of each season.

Andrew “ Rube” Foster named John “Tenny” Blount, the franchise owner for the Detroit Stars. In reality, Blount, a local gambler and numbers runner could not raise the financing to own the team and functioned as the general manager until the mid twenties when Roesink, reassumed ownership.


Mack Park ceased to exist as a venue for the National Negro League in July, 1929, when a fire broke out due to careless grounds keeping. No one was killed but 220 were injured when the grandstand collapsed. The Detroit Stars played out the season at Dequindre Park In 1930, the Detroit Stars, the franchise still owned by Roesink, moved his franchise to Hamtramck.

Mack Park was eventually rehabilitated for use by Southeastern High School for their baseball team and used for that purpose into the 1960’s. At that time, an influx of federal monies enabled the City of Detroit to build new eastside housing. Mack Park was razed to build condo-housing units named Fairview after the street it abuts. The street Fairview was originally called O’Flynn. Fairview Village, which existed between 1903 and 1907, renamed this street in its own honor.

Several players of the Negro National League have been inducted into the Hall of Fame. Of the Detroit Stars Hall of Famers, the most notable is Norman “Turkey” Stearnes. Turkey, a consistent high hitter, got his nickname from his habit of flapping his arms while he ran bases.