Photo from mlblog.com article/public domain photo The 1895 Warren Wonders. Al Wagner, Honus’ brother, is third from left in the bottom row while Honus is third from left in the top row, wearing the uniform of the Steubenville squad he played for before coming to Warren. Inset, the most famous baseball card ever ­ the T206 Honus Wagner. Though few remain, some have sold for millions of dollars.

Johannes Peter Wagner — more commonly known as Honus — is undoubtedly one of the greatest baseball players that ever lived.

He was part of the inaugural class of the Baseball Hall of Fame, receiving the same number of votes as Babe Ruth.

In 1999 — 44 years after his death — he was #13 in Sporting News’ list of 100 greatest players, included as the top shortstop.

And for a little over two months in 1895, Wagner’s rookie year in professional baseball, he played ball for a team in Warren.

For $50 a month.

Before the 1895 season, Wagner was just 21 years old and had been playing ball around the suburbs of Pittsburgh where he was raised. He had been working in an older brother’s barber shop.

He left the barbershop for the ball yard for good when, according to a blog post from Major League Baseball’s historian, the owner of a club in Steubenville, Ohio offered him $35 a month to sign with the team.

Later, the owner recalled Wagner’s brother, Al, saying “I’ve got a brother who is a peach. He’s loafing now, and maybe you could get him to play for you. If so, you won’t go wrong. He’s a great ballplayer.”

In the first few months of the season, Wagner planed for teams in Steubenville and Mansfield, Ohio and Adrian, Michigan before the Warren Evening Democrat broke the news that Wagner had been signed to play for the Warren Wonders in the Iron and Oil League.

His brother, Al, as well as several teammates from the Steubenville squad, had joined the Warren team a month earlier.

According to the blog post, Wagner played his first game in Warren the following day, July 11 and his last game on September 11, “a total of sixty-three days during which he missed twenty-one because of an injury to his throwing arm and several others because no ball was played on Sundays.”

In that period, 34 league games were scheduled as well as an additional 10 exhibitions.

When Wagner arrived in Warren, the team was in fifth place and under .500.

His first game here was July 11.

The team played its games at Recreation Park, which appears to have been located at the intersection of Dartmouth Street and Pennsylvania Avenue on the south side of the street. The Pittsburg Post had remarked that the field was the finest in the league and seated at least 1,000.

Wagner hit the ground running.

Playing first base and hitting cleanup, Wagner hit a double and stole a base.

The next day he played right field and shortstop the day after that – a game in which he recorded four hits, a home run, three runs, three RBIs and two stolen bases.

The Evening Democrat noted at that early stage of his career that “John Wagner covers a great deal of ground at short.”

His ninth game, an exhibition, was a loss at Recreation Park before a crowd of 1,000 to Connie Mack’s Pittsburgh Pirates.

Box scores were inconsistent, at best, in that era but surviving box scores for his first 17 games indicate he hit .324, playing right field and third base primarily.

On July 29, the Democrat reported an injury – that Wagner “while running to catch the train at Titusville… fell and received a rather severe cut under his right arm. The muscles were not affected but it took several stitches to close up the wound.”

The injury would knock Wagner out of action for three weeks. Once week after he returned, the league started to disintegrate as three teams disbanded.

The timing was particularly stinging for the Warren team as the Wonders had won 12-in-a-row to climb into first place in the league’s second half.

By August, Wagner was starting to be referred to as “Hannes”

The league started to crumble and owners pieced together a “championship” series in Wheeling, West Virginia that the Wonders would lose four games to two.

With the team back in Warren by September 12, management wanted to keep playing.

One problem: The players hadn’t been paid since the first month of the season. The players and management couldn’t come to terms on wages and the players voted to go home, with the manager and the Wagner brothers the last to leave.

Statistics for these leagues are incomplete and, often, inaccurate.

So here’s what we think we know about Wagner’s rookie year.

He played a host of positions across his stops in 1895 – 10 games at shortstop, 18 at third base, 17 at second base, 17 in the outfield, one at first base and five pitching.

At Warren?

He hit .324 – 22 hits in 68 at-bats over his first 17 games, including 11 stolen bases and an underwhelming .862 fielding percentage.

1895 wasn’t the only time, though, that Wagner would be in Warren.

But it won’t all fit here. Check out the E Section Diversions opener for more on Wagner and his time here.