Dr. J. L. Moorefield and Moorefield Ballpark, 1920

Doc Moorefield became St. Pete’s Mr. Baseball for 1920

Epilogue

Moorefield is done with baseball in St. Pete but not yet done with baseball. In 1921 he tries promoting a barnstorming team of Cubans he had brought over in 1920. He writes to a Fort Scott, Kan., franchise looking to schedule games for his “Cuban All-Star” team that will be travelling through Kansas, Missouri and Oklahoma. Around the same time, he contacted the Alton, Ill., franchise planning a tour of Georgia, Tennessee, Kentucky, Ohio, Indiana and Illinois. There is no further indication that either plan came to fruition.

Moorefield stays in St. Pete for the most part and in 1921 immerses himself in local politics. He is friends with Noel Mitchell, who had been elected mayor in the ’20 election succeeding Lang. Mitchell was accused of having a drunken party in the mayor’s office, and impeachment was being brought against Mitchell. Not only was this Prohibition, but St. Pete had voted to be dry going back to 1913.  Moorefield attempted some legal maneuverings to get Mitchell off of the hook. Those were dismissed by the judge who saw through his scheme.

Perhaps the most spectacular adventure in Moorefield’s year of 1921 occurred due to his unabating baseball fandom. In October, he and a group of five or six friends took a small vessel through the bay to Bradenton to take in the Bradenton/Tampa Smokers game. Most games started at 2:30 or 3:00 PM so it is likely they were sailing for home around 5:00 PM or later. It turned into a harrowing experience as the boat was tossed and turned by heavy winds and turbulent waters. Three hours later they managed to arrive back at St. Pete safely. The date was October 21, and by midnight the hurricane of ’21 was in full force. The Brantley Pier, which is in the yacht basin they likely returned to, was destroyed.

This was the last hurricane to record nearly a direct hit on Tampa Bay until Helene and Milton in 2024. Like Helene, it was the storm surge that caused major amounts of damage to the area. In fact, the field that was constructed south of the railroad tracks on the waterfront had its structures (grandstand, dugouts) washed away and /or blown down. When the Braves agreed to come to St. Pete for Spring Training in 1922, it left the city only 24 days to completely build a stadium.

The fall of 1922 sees Moorefield nabbed, in what was likely a money-making scheme. On September 14, 1922, Moorefield is arrested in Asheville, N.C., on drug distribution charges.  Authorities found in his hotel room a suitcase that contained a gun and was otherwise full of opium and morphine. It was found that he had been writing prescriptions in St. Pete, Tampa, Miami and Jacksonville.  He was catering only to “retailors” who distributed opiates to “snowbirds”.

Moorefield’s father told the judge that his son had been a drug addict for seven years and the family did not know of his whereabouts. The judge released him on “parole” after the father promised to commit Moorefield to a sanitorium in Greensboro. There is a interesting sidebar to this story though. Brother J. R. Moorefield had fled the county several months prior when he was caught transporting bootleg liquor. I suspect the family knew where Moorefield was. I have found no record of the disposition of his case. It appears he lost either his medical license or the ability to write prescriptions because from here on his occupation is simply listed as oculist, solely handling vision issues, although he retains the title of Dr. He perhaps decides to lay “low” as his misadventures were reported in the St, Petersburg Daily Times. It is reported that he bought a home in Mt. Airy, N. C.

Moorefield retained many real estate holdings around St. Pete. Moorefield Heights in North St. Petersburg was one of the subdivisions he developed. Things stay pretty quiet for him publicly until 1928. Moorefield and a partner were arrested for running a gambling operation in the basement of a building he owned in St. Pete at 117 9th St. S. The drugstore that operated on the street level above was not cited for any involvement. The men and others caught in the sting bonded out. His lawyer claims it was just a friendly game of cards.

This same location might have been a magnet for men who liked “friendly card games.” In the late teens through 1920s, the 9th Street property had a barber shop and drug store owned by John L. Nicks. At this time Nicks also owned and managed the 9th Street Negro Nine. There were several arrests of Nicks for illegal sale of liquor, gambling and also a number of speeding tickets.

After the 1928 arrest, Moorefield may have skipped town for a bit, as it is several years before another press mention. In 1935 he announces the opening of another office in St. Pete. He was returning from Jefferson Springs, N. C., where he had moved 5 years before.

It appears from an interview given in 1966, and his obituary in 1968, that Moorefield remained in St. Pete the remainder of his life. Dr. Jonas L. “Doc” Moorefield died at 83 years old in August 1968. He had a wife, but no children.