Prince Oana

Henry "Hank" Kawaihoa "Prince" Oana Jr. (January 22, 1910 – June 19, 1976) was a professional baseball player for 23 years from 1929 to 1951. He played portions of three seasons in Major League Baseball as an outfielder for the Philadelphia Phillies in 1934, and as a pinch hitter and pitcher for Detroit Tigers in 1943 and 1945. When Oana debuted with the Phillies, he became the fourth Hawaiian player to appear in the major leagues. He compiled a .308 batting average and a 3.77 earned run average (ERA) in three major league seasons.

Born in Hawaii, Oana played five sports in high school, and took up baseball professionally after he was noticed by Ty Cobb. He spent a few seasons in the minor leagues before joining the Phillies, who sent him back to the minors after six games in 1934. For the next decade, he played for various minor league teams, where his Hawaiian heritage proved to be both a selling point for teams and a hindrance to him making the majors, until the outbreak of World War II. Facing a shortage of active players, the Tigers signed him, and Oana played parts of 1943 and 1945 with the team. After 1945, he was sold to the Dallas Rebels, and he finished his professional career in 1951. He later operated a lakeside fishing business until his death in 1976.

Early years Oana was born at Waipahu, Hawaii, the site of the former Oahu Sugar Company plantation, in 1910.

Oana attended Saint Louis School in Honolulu where he had the nickname "Nutsky," He was a running back in football and was twice (1926 and 1927) selected for the Interscholastic League of Honolulu all-star team.

He spent the 1929 season with the Globe Bears, San Francisco's affiliate in the Class D Arizona State League. Portland manager Spencer Abbott noted that the deal required the Phillies to pay "$2500 for a look" and $20,000 if he was retained for the years." Portland manager Spencer Abbott also boasted that he was the one who had invested Oana "with the halo of Hawaiian royalty."

Oana's Hawaiian heritage was also a handicap in an era before racial integration of Major League Baseball. In January 1934, shortly after Oana had been acquired by the Phillies, The Sporting News wrote a feature story about Oana under the headline, "'Prince' Oana Pops Into the Big League Melting Pot: Adding Dash of Hawaii to Cuban and Indian Spice." Author Daniel M. Daniel offered Oana's promotion to the Phillies as evidence that, "while baseball is as American as America itself, it is also as cosmopolitan as our national population." Daniel wrote that, without going into the justice of the color line, the color line in baseball "is adhered to most strictly."

To overcome the color line, Graham backed away from the story that Oana was a full-blooded Hawaiian prince and noted that Oana's mother was Portuguese. However, Graham could still not find a major league buyer for Oana. Finding no interest from major league clubs after his 1934 season in Atlanta, Oana reportedly expressed interest in pursuing a career as a professional wrestler, with one account indicating that he hoped to "cash in" on his "wrestling experience on the island with Japanese grapplers." Rogers Hornsby took over as the manager at Fort Worth in 1942, and Oana badgered Hornsby for a chance as a pitcher. and resulted in a feature story in The Sporting News. In a total of 25 games as a pitcher during the 1942 season, Oana compiled a 16–5 record with a 1.72 ERA. and he appeared in 20 games for that team. However, baseball commissioner Kenesaw Mountain Landis ruled that Oana was a free agent since the Texas League had disbanded. In late June 1943, Oana signed with the Detroit Tigers. In an introductory interview with the Detroit press, Oana had this to say about his supposed connection to Hawaiian royalty: When I first joined the Seals, stories were published that I was a Hawaiian prince. The more I denied them, the more people believed them. I'm plain plain Henry Oana. Just call me Hank. In the second game of the double header, the Yankees led 5–2 in the third inning. Detroit manager Steve O'Neill brought in his newly acquired pitcher, Oana. O'Neill reportedly concluded that "the game was lost and so why waste his good pitchers." Oana compiled a 13–13 record with a 3.63 ERA in 38 games for the Bisons in 1944. He also spent most of the 1945 season in Buffalo, compiling a 15–14 record (4.20 ERA) in 31 games. His only major league game as a starting pitcher was on September 12, 1945, against the Philadelphia Athletics: Oana allowed one hit through the first eight innings, pitched innings and allowed only two runs, though the Tigers lost the game, 3–2, in the 16th inning. He finished the 1946 season with a 24–10 record, a 2.54 ERA, a .303 batting average and seven home runs in 185 at bats. By 1942, he had remarried to Patricial Hall of Atlanta. In the spring of 1952, Oana underwent surgery in Austin, Texas, to remove cataracts from his right eye. He reportedly underwent eye surgery five times over the next 10 years and lived and worked during the late 1950s and early 1960s in a rehabilitation center for the blind in Austin, Texas. He worked there as an instructor teaching crafts to the totally blind.

In his later years, Oana regained much of his vision and continued living in Austin, Texas. He operated a lakeside fishing business and was also a captain with the Travis County Sheriff's Department.