Charles Somers

American coal industry executive and baseball owner

Charles W. Somers (October 13, 1868 – June 29, 1934) was an American executive in the coal industry in Cleveland, Ohio, who also achieved prominence in professional baseball. The financial resources from his business interests allowed Somers to become one of the principal founders of baseball's American League in 1901. In the early years of the American League, Somers owned the teams now known as the Boston Red Sox and the Cleveland Guardians.

Somers was born in Newark, Ohio, in 1868 and moved with his family to Cleveland in 1884. At the insistence of Ban Johnson, the first American League president, Somers and Jack Kilfoyl, who owned a popular Cleveland men's furnishings store, became the first owners of the franchise now known as the Cleveland Guardians. Kilfoyl was Cleveland's first team president and treasurer, while Somers was its vice president and main financier. Somers was also the principal owner of the Boston Red Sox, a team which had no official nickname until 1908, but was initially sometimes called the "Somersets" in his honor. Residing in Cleveland and traveling to Boston, Somers was also the American League's vice president during the trade war for independence of and equality with the National League which was won in 1903 with the playing of the first World Series. Somers' money helped keep some American League teams afloat in their first years, including the St. Louis Browns, Charles Comiskey's Chicago White Sox and Connie Mack's Philadelphia Athletics. He was interred at Lake View Cemetery.