Chief Wahoo is a former logo last used by the Cleveland Indians in 2018 (the Cleveland Guardians after 2021), a Major League Baseball (MLB) franchise based in Cleveland, Ohio, and is still used in merchandise.
As part of the larger Native American mascot controversy, the logo drew criticism from Native Americans, social scientists, and religious and educational groups, but was popular among fans of the team. During the 2010s, it was gradually replaced by a block "C", which became the primary logo in 2013. Chief Wahoo was officially retired following the 2018 season, with it also barred from future National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum plaques and merchandise sold outside of Ohio. In 2020, in the wake of the George Floyd protests taking place across the United States, the Indians announced they would conduct a review of their name, and in 2021, announced they would retire it after the 2021 season, with a new name taking over the trademark at the beginning of the 2022 season. In November 2021, the team announced their new name as the Cleveland Guardians.
History In 1932, the front page of the Cleveland Plain Dealer featured a cartoon by Fred George Reinert that used a caricatured Native American character with a definite resemblance to the later Chief Wahoo as a stand-in for the Cleveland Indians winning an important victory. The character came to be called "The Little Indian", eventually becoming a fixture in the paper's coverage of the team, including a small front-page visual box where his head would peek out to announce the outcome of the latest game. Journalist George Condon would write in 1972, "When the baseball club decided to adopt an Indian caricature as its official symbol, it hired an artist to draw a little guy who came very close to Reinert's creation; a blood brother, unquestionably."
In 1947, Cleveland Indians owner Bill Veeck hired the J.F. Novak Company, designers of patches worn by the Cleveland police and fire departments, to create a new logo for his team. Seventeen-year-old draftsman Walter Goldbach, an employee of the Novak Company, was asked to perform the job. Tasked with creating a mascot that "would convey a spirit of pure joy and unbridled enthusiasm", he created a smiling face with yellow skin and a prominent nose. Goldbach has said that he had difficulty "figuring out how to make an Indian look like a cartoon", and that he was probably influenced by the cartoon style that was popular at the time.
How the name "Chief Wahoo" came to be used to refer to the Indians' mascot is less clear. The phrase had already been used for years before its use as a reference to the logo; the popular newspaper comic strip Big Chief Wahoo ran from 1936 to 1947. One questionable origin myth indicates that the names "Indians" and "Chief Wahoo" were meant to honor Louis Sockalexis, an outfielder for the Indians' predecessors, the Cleveland Spiders, and one of the first Native Americans to play in Major League Baseball. The Penobscot, Sockalexis' tribe, petitioned the Cleveland Indians to discontinue the use of Chief Wahoo.
Another Native American baseball player, Allie Reynolds, pitched for the Indians for five years beginning in 1942, mostly as a starter. He was later traded to the New York Yankees. On October 6, 1950, the Plain Dealer, under the title of "Chief Wahoo Whizzing", stated "Allie (Chief Wahoo) Reynolds, the copper-skinned Creek," lost to Philadelphia, but "in the clutches, though, the Chief was a standup gent—tougher than Sitting Bull." In subsequent articles, Reynolds was again called "Chief Wahoo", "old Wahoo", and just plain "Wahoo".
In 1952, "Chief Wahoo" was given as the name for the Indians' physical mascot for the first time when a person in a Wahoo costume showed up for a children's party at Public Hall given by "Cleveland's dentists". Sportswriters eventually took to calling the unnamed character "Chief Wahoo". Goldbach has said that the logo's moniker is inaccurate. Quoting a child he met while talking at a school, Goldbach explained in a 2008 interview, "He's not a chief, he's a brave. He only has one feather. Chiefs have full headdresses."
In 1951, the mascot was redesigned with a smaller nose and red skin instead of yellow skin. This would be the most long-lived version of the logo, with only minor changes; when it was first introduced, it had black outlines before being changed to have blue outlines in 1979. After its introduction, the face of the 1951 logo was incorporated into other full-body depictions of the character.
Ohio sportswriter Terry Pluto has described comics of Chief Wahoo that would run on the front page of the Cleveland Plain Dealer in the 1950s, with the character's depiction signifying the outcome of a game. Wins were illustrated by Chief Wahoo holding a lantern in one hand and extending the index finger on his other. Losses were illustrated by a "battered" Chief Wahoo, complete with black eye, missing teeth and crumpled feathers.
The Chief Wahoo logo was last worn by the Indians in a loss to the Houston Astros in the ALDS on October 8, 2018. News outlets noted the irony of the logo's final appearance being on Indigenous Peoples' Day/Columbus Day.
Later variations
By 1973, when the team was bought by Cleveland businessman Nick Mileti, they had introduced additional depictions of Chief Wahoo, some of which showed the character at bat. Mileti hired designer Leonard Benner to modify an existing at-bat design for use as a logo. Several changes were made: Wahoo's nose was made smaller, his body thinner, and he was now drawn as a right-handed batter instead of left-handed. Overall, the design of Chief Wahoo remained largely similar to the previous version.
When Cleveland Municipal Stadium installed a new computer-programmed monocolor scoreboard in 1977, newspaper articles described how it could display animated depictions of Chief Wahoo yelling "Charge!" By the 1978 season, home runs were celebrated with fireworks and a scoreboard animation of Chief Wahoo dancing. The complete package of commissioned animations included an arrow skewering two players to signify a double-play.
During his tenure as president of the team, Peter Bavasi asked players how the uniforms should look. Bavasi has described Joe Carter and Pat Tabler suggesting that Chief Wahoo be added to the hats, with Tabler predicting that it would "sell like crazy". Bavasi recalls expressing concern that it would offend Native American groups, but that player Bert Blyleven reassured him, "Nah, it shouldn't. Really looks like [manager] Phil Seghi." Blyleven made a similar remark to Sports Illustrated, who described the resemblance as "uncanny". Tabler's prediction was ultimately borne out, with hat sales increasing significantly after the reintroduction of Chief Wahoo. The revised hat design has been described as a change "in keeping with Major League Baseball's trend toward 'old-style' simulacra."
Around the time Bavasi added Chief Wahoo to the team's hats in 1986, he also banned "derogatory" banners at the stadium. The elimination of references to Cleveland on the uniforms, including replacing the old style hats with Chief Wahoo, led to speculation that the team might be moved to another city ("Cleveland" was omitted on road jerseys from 1972 to 1977 and from 1983 to 1988; from 1978 to 1982, the city name was on the road grays, but the team often wore navy jerseys with the team name instead of the city name for many road games).
Move to Jacobs Field In 1994, the Indians moved from the Cleveland Municipal Stadium to Jacobs Field (later renamed Progressive Field). They considered replacing Chief Wahoo in 1993, but it was ultimately retained. Several years later, the Associated Press reported that the debate had not hurt the team's souvenir sales, which were better than those of any other team in the league at the time.
From 1962 through 1994, a -tall, neon-lit sign of Chief Wahoo at bat stood above gate D of Cleveland Municipal Stadium. When the stadium was demolished, the neon sign was donated to the Western Reserve Historical Society. Working with the original blueprints, and the help of $50,000 in donations, the historical society refurbished the sign, which is now displayed in the group's museum. Anonymous donors have since provided funds to support maintenance work that allows the sign to remain lit.
According to a senior vice president and historian at the Western Reserve Historical Society, the acquisition of a neon Chief Wahoo sign was debated for several reasons. Among them was the belief that it was "hugely negative for a portion of the population". Ultimately, the historical society decided that "history is history. This sign is a point in a major American issue, which is racial caricature. Some people have a problem with it, some people don't. It's important because it not only represents the rich history of baseball in Cleveland, it gets into a really deep issue in American history." The sign is displayed with written materials that show several points of view, including "The Legacy of Racism Continues", "Chief Wahoo: Brief History of a Civic Icon", and "Enthusiasm! That's Chief Wahoo!"
Battle flag over USS Cleveland
For several years, the USS Cleveland flew a battle flag featuring the Chief Wahoo logo. The time and circumstances under which the flag was first flown are not known, but the flag was retired in 2006 and presented to former Cleveland pitcher and World War II veteran Bob Feller. The flag had previously flown over center field at Cleveland Stadium.
Use during spring training
In 2009, the Cleveland Indians moved their spring training operations from their Grapefruit League home in Winter Haven, Florida to their new Cactus League home in Goodyear, Arizona. During the years the team trained in the Grapefruit League, a mural of Chief Wahoo was displayed on a nearby municipal water tower, which was touched up at least once in 1993. However, because of the team's impending move, the city of Winter Haven did not bother to repaint the logo when it eventually faded. Due to the expense of repainting the water tower, the logo remained there long after the team last trained in Florida; it was not until 2012 that it was finally replaced with Polk State College's logo.
Chief Wahoo creator Walter Goldbach and his wife spent 15 winters living in Winter Haven. During the spring training season, Goldbach would work with the team when they conducted tours. Goldbach later retired from his career as an artist, and medical issues prevented him from drawing in the last few years of his life. He died in December 2017 at the age of 88.
Merchandise and promotional tie-ins An early piece of Chief Wahoo merchandise depicts a squatting Native American figure holding a stone tool in one hand and a scalp in the other. Produced in 1949 by Rempel Manufacturing, Inc., of Akron, Ohio, the rubber Indian figure (marketed as "Big Chief Erie") was based on an original sketch by Plain Dealer cartoonist Fred G. Reinert.
For its 100th anniversary, the team gave away blankets that depicted various incarnations of Chief Wahoo. In 2011, the team gave away free T-shirts with a picture of a heart, a peace sign and Chief Wahoo. The West Side Leader of Akron, Ohio declared this design "a lot better than the previous freebie shirt, which featured representations of three racing hot dogs".
In 2005, the team partnered with a candy maker to produce a Chief Wahoo chocolate bar. In 2013, the name "Wahoo Women" was used for a ladies' night out promotion, and the team also ran a "Wahoo Wednesdays" promotion with Domino's Pizza.