Big Horn County, Wyoming
Jim "Big Jim" Bluejacket
Items submitted by Carole Hill Martin
Pekin, Ill.
Jim "Big Jim" Bluejacket was born in Oklahoma, half white and half Cherokee Indian.
In 1911, he moved to Pekin, IL. to be a pitcher forPekin's semi-pro baseball team. In Pekin, he met and
married Jennie Piro, my mother's oldest sister. He played for several semi-pro teams and played in
the big leagues for a couple of years.
One of the semi-pro teams he played for was located in Greybull, Wyoming. I guess he and Jennie must have liked it there because they made it their home away from home.
1- Nagle, 2 Kimpling, p 3 Bluejacket, p 4 Moore, c 5 Holla, 1st
6 Aktond, c 7 Bristow, rf 8 Eddlemon, p 9 Kelley, p 10 Reagan, ss
11 Garrity, 3rd 12 Keltus, lf 13 Crawford, 2nd
His brother, Lewis Bluejacket, holding Jimmy Bluejacket
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while Big Jim traveled. Fred was a pretty fair baseball pitcher himself.
After baseball, Jim traveled around the world working for Standard Oil. He lived in Aruba for many years working for Standard Oil and promoting youth baseball in that country.
The Casper Tribune-Herald
[probably written around 1943/44 - submitted by Carole Hill Martin - transcribed by K. Torp]
Beating Casper was Job Given Greybull Hurler
Jim Bluejacket, Former Midwest League Star, Visits Here on Return from Aruba
"Can you beat Casper?"
That was the only question put to big Jim Bluejacket, only major league hurler on record to win a game without pitching a ball, when he signed up with the Greybull club of the Midwest league back in 1920.
Jim did not offer any guarantee in answer to the jocose query voiced by B.L. Warren, head of the Greybull plant of the Midwest Refining company. He made good, however, and did a spectacular job of it, as older baseball fans will recall, and it was just one of the incidents of which he was reminded here yesterday.
In Casper with Mrs. Bluejacket on their way from Aruba to reestablish their home in Greybull after being retired from oil refinery work, Jim was in a reminiscent mood. He talked over old times with John and Rolla Mapel, former rival moundsmen who helped pitch Casper to the league pennant, and with other old friends and acquaintances. He recounted the origin of an association of 23 years ago that won him many friends and has drawn him back to Wyoming.
The story from Aruba about his prospective retirement to a farm in Oklahoma is all wrong, he said. He did buy a farm there but it will be operated by his brother. An ambition he had cherished for many years to return to this state and to Greybull hit him with full force when his number came up on the retirement list at the world's largest refinery off Venezuela, and he is on the way to realization of his resolution.
Bluejacket related that he was helping to put in a crop on a farm near Worland when he was told that Greybull was organizing a ball club. In his pocket was a contract with the Columbus club of the American Association, and he was putting in his time at hard work while waiting the call for spring training.
Not much impressed with the possibilities at Greybull, he made a trip to the ball park there, and the feeling was mutual when the firstfanofwhom he made inquiry looked over his work clothes without knowledge of his identity. He admits that he did not look much like a ballplayer. At the park, however, he looked over the field and saw several familiar faces in uniform - men he had played with in organized baseball.
"Somebody is paying for this and they must have money to land these players", he thought. The latter caught sight of him, introduced him to the manager, Hal Brokaw, and he was taken to the office of the refinery management.
"Here is a baseball player," Warren was told. And that is when he asked the question about beating Casper, inadvertently paying a compliment to the club being formed here. Casper was the team to beat and the hunch proved correct.
How Bluejacket made good is illustrated by the story about the home run that he belted out of the athletic park, now the high school stadium field, to win his own game. He literally clouted the ball out of sight diagonally across the big park and only those in the press box atop the grandstand caught another glimpse of it when it bounced on the railroad property.
That was an eight-inning blow that put the game on ice for Greybull, and Warren saw it. Jim has good cause to remember it because the hat was passed and fans chipped in a gift of $135 in cash. When the word reached Greybull the fans wanted to make him mayor of the town, and most Greybull residents were red-hot fans.
Greybull had other stars that year, notably Herman Merritt, whose baseball career was cut short when he suffered injuries in an auto accident in South Carolina that later proved fatal. Merritt finished the season with Detroit the year he played at Greybull and was hailed as the biggest find of the year in the majors. He scooped them up at short with apparent ease, handling the hottest blows without error and whipping them to first from any position.
Bluejacket talked of many of the old timers and of Casper in particular. He was a good friend of all the Casper players and looked forward to the games here. He recalls that the local fans were always ready to give him a hand or anything else. They always had their hand in their pocket ready to help a ball player, he said.
Bluejacket said he felt at home in the Henning hotel, then the Midwest, where the club put up.
"Talk about booms," he said, "you couldn't hardly get through the lobby for the crowd. There were boards for trading in oil stocks and when $500 was offered on Greybull it would be erased a minute later. Fans who didn't want to bet had to keep their money in their pockets."
Jim made it plain that he was glad to get back to Wyoming, said he couldn't go through Casper without stopping. He also spoke in high praise of the treatment he had received during his years of employment with the oil company. The Aruba plant is now owned and operated by a subsidiary of the Standard of New Jersey and its manager is Lloyd G. Smith, former resident of Casper who lived on South Lincoln. Don J. Smith, a brother, is head of a refinery in Texas.
Many former Casperites are still working and living on Aruba and they have done well, Jim said. All have taken advantage of opportunities for advancement.
Among other experiences told by Bluejacket within the limitations of censorship is how the war came to Aruba. The island and its big industry were caught in the backwash when U-boats invaded South American waters and ships were lost. One torpedo that missed its mark near shore reached the beach and exploded, however, but it has been closely guarded and protected.
When he retired from Standard Oil, he and Jennie went back to Greybull. 
When Jim's health failed, they returned to Pekin, IL. where he passed away in 1947. After retirement, Jennie moved back to Greybull, Wy. to live out the rest of her life. She died in 1987. Jim and Jennie are buried in the St. Joseph Cemetery in Pekin, IL.
James Louis "Jimmy" Bluejacket, son of "Big Jim" and Jennie eventually moved to the Big Horn Mountains where he operated the Bluejacket Dude Ranch in Shell, Big Horn County, Wyoming.
James Louis "Jimmy" Bluejacket, son of "Big Jim" and Jennie eventually moved to the Big Horn Mountains 
where he operated the Bluejacket Dude Ranch in Shell, Big Horn County, Wyoming.
Sometime, in the '70's, Jimmy closed the ranch and moved into Greybull, Wyoming where he operated a restaurant until his death in 1981.
Obituary for Jimmy Bluejacket
James Louis Bluejacket
GREYBULL - James Louis Bluejacket, 63, died Monday, Dec. 14 (1981) at his home here. He was born Nov. 18, 1918 in Adair, Okla., the son of James and Jennie (Piro) Bluejacket.
He moved to the Dutch West Indies with his parents, where he spent his school years. He came to Greybull in 1945. In 1962 he owned and operated the Bluejacket guest ranch and country club in Shell. At the time of his death he was a corporate member of the Bluejacket Restaurant in Greybull. He was a member of Elks Lodge 1431 in Greybull and Eagles Aerie 3086 in Basin.
He is survived by his mother Jennie of Greybull; [an uncle, Tony Piro and two aunts, Mrs. Mamie Hill and Mrs. Lottie Meskimen, all of Pekin.] , two nieces, Patti Wilkinson of Great Falls, Mont. and Cozette Williamson of Greybull; three great-nieces and five great-nephews. [His father and a brother, Fred, preceded him in death.]
Funeral services will be 10 a.m. Thursday, Dec. 17 at the Elks Lodge in Greybull with the Elks officers officiating. Atwood Family Funeral Directors are in charge of arrangements.
Obituary for Jimmy Bluejacket
James L. Bluejacket
Greybull, Wyo. -- James Louis Bluejacket, who came to Greybull in 1945 and since 1962 had owned the Bluejacket Guest Ranch and County Club, died Monday at age 63 at his home in Greybull.
He was a member of the Elks Lodge of Greybull, the Eagles lodge of Basin, and the corporate board of the Bluejacket Restaurant in Greybull.A native of Adair, Okla., he is the son of James and Jennie Bluejacket. His family lived in the Dutch West Indies where he spent his school years.
Survivors include his mother of Greybull; two nieces, Patti Wilkinson of Great Falls and Cozette Williamson of Greybull; two grand-nieces and five grand-nephews.Services will be 10 am Thursday in the Greybull Elks Club. The Atwood Family Funeral Directors are in charge.
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Obituary for Jimmy Bluejacket
James Louis Bluejacket
GREYBULL - James Louis Bluejacket, 63, died Monday, Dec. 14 (1981) at his home here. He was born Nov. 18, 1918 in Adair, Okla., the son of James and Jennie (Piro) Bluejacket.
He moved to the Dutch West Indies with his parents, where he spent his school years. He came to Greybull in 1945. In 1962 he owned and operated the Bluejacket guest ranch and country club in Shell. At the time of his death he was a corporate member of the Bluejacket Restaurant in Greybull. He was a member of Elks Lodge 1431 in Greybull and Eagles Aerie 3086 in Basin.
He is survived by his mother Jennie of Greybull; [an uncle, Tony Piro and two aunts, Mrs. Mamie Hill and Mrs. Lottie Meskimen, all of Pekin.] , two nieces, Patti Wilkinson of Great Falls, Mont. and Cozette Williamson of Greybull; three great-nieces and five great-nephews. [His father and a brother, Fred, preceded him in death.]
Funeral services will be 10 a.m. Thursday, Dec. 17 at the Elks Lodge in Greybull with the Elks officers officiating.
Atwood Family Funeral Directors are in charge of arrangements.
Honor Ex-Pekin Big Leaguer
Pekin, IL. Daily Times in 1968
- submitted by Carole Hill Martin - transcribed by K. Torp
There may be very few around who remember him now but Pekin once had a big league pitcher named Jimmy Bluejacket - and now a street has been named for him in the improbable place of Aruba in the Dutch West Indies.Blue Jacket died in 1947 at the ag
e of 60, but not before he made quite a contribution to the baseball scene in Aruba. Employed there for 15 years, he devoted countless hours to the youth of Aruba and was instrumental in the founding of the Lago Sports Park there.
Bluejacket, born in Oklahoma pitched for Brooklyn in the old Federal League in 1914-15 and then spent the next season with Cincinnati in theNational.In three years in the majors, he won 14 games and lost 16.
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