page_title: John B. Thayer
section_title: Early life and cricket career
hierarchical_section_title: John B. Thayer / Early life and cricket career
caption_attribution_description: English: Philadelphian cricketer John Thayer as a member of the 1879 University of Pennsylvania baseball team.
context_page_description: John Borland Thayer II was an American businessman who had a thirty-year career as an executive with the Pennsylvania Railroad Company. He was a director and second vice-president of the company when he died less than a week before his 50th birthday in the sinking of the RMS Titanic, on April 15, 1912. In his youth, Thayer was also a prominent sportsman, playing baseball and lacrosse for the University of Pennsylvania and first-class cricket for the Philadelphian cricket team. He is the only first-class cricketer known to have died aboard Titanic.
context_section_description: Thayer was born in Philadelphia and attended the University of Pennsylvania, where he was captain of the lacrosse team in 1879 and also played baseball. A member of a prominent American cricketing family, he played his first match for the Merion Cricket Club as a 14-year-old  and continued playing for them until his death. Thayer was a part of the Philadelphian side that visited England in 1884. During that tour he scored only 1 run, with an average of 28, and took 22 wickets for 21 runs each. In his career, Thayer appeared in seven matches now recognised as first-class. Three of these were played for the Philadelphians, and four were played for an "American Born" side. All were played at the Germantown Cricket Club in Pennsylvania. In his first-class career, he scored 138 runs at 11.50 and took six wickets at 26.83. His highest score (24) and best bowling (3 for 17) both came for Philadelphia against the United States in October 1883. In minor cricket, his highest scores were 134 not out v Philadelphia in 1896 and 107 not out against Winnipeg in 1882, both for Merion CC.
caption: Thayer as a UPenn baseball player (1879)
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