Baseball - An Index Of Baseball Stories

An Index Of Local Baseball Stories 

The New York Yankees played in Bloomsburg [and Mount Caramel]; Babe Ruth both visited, and played, in Williamsport; First Mifflinburg, and then Sunbury were home to professional baseball team;, and the Little League World Series originated in Williamsport.  

The first player to hit a home run in a World Series was from Williamsport, and other professional players came from Montomgery, Lewisburg, and from the coal mines in Shamokin.  

Selinsgrove had a Fatman vs Leanman Baseball Game, and in Watsontown, an umpire was thrown in the river after the team disapproved of his calls.

There are a lot of baseball stories, and a lot of baseball history, in our area.  I've barely made a dent, but here is an index of what I've found so far.

I wanted to open this index with a history of the origins of baseball.  I don't really know all that much about baseball myself, so I set out to see what others had to say.

Turns out, none of the baseball historians agree.  Some say it was first mentioned in a diary of a soldier at Valley Forge, others mention a 1786 diary entry by a Princeton University student who describes playing "baste ball".  In 1791 in  Pittsfield, Massachusetts, an ordinance barred the playing of baseball within 80 yards of the town meeting house and its glass windows

But my favorite story sounds like something written by Henry Shoemaker, although this one is not his doing.  

"In 1903, the British-born sportswriter Henry Chadwick published an article speculating that baseball was derived from an English game called rounders, which Chadwick had played as a boy in England. Baseball executive Albert Spalding disagreed, asserting that the game was fundamentally American and had hatched on American soil. To settle the matter, the two men appointed a commission, headed by Abraham Mills, the fourth president of the National League of Professional Baseball Clubs.

 The commission, which also included six other sports executives, labored for three years, finally declaring that Abner Doubleday had invented the national pastime.  Doubleday "...never knew that he had invented baseball. But 15 years after his death, he was anointed as the father of the game," writes baseball historian John Thorn.

 The myth about Doubleday inventing the game of baseball actually came from a Colorado mining engineer who claimed to have been present at the moment of creation. The miner's tale was never corroborated, nonetheless the myth was born and persists to this day"

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Local Baseball Stories & History

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Players Who Played For The Pros:

• Blair, Walter -  Bucknell Student, later settled in Lewisburg
• Coveleski, Stan - Shamokin
• Rhawn, Bobby - Catawissa
• Sebring, Jimmy - a graduate of Bucknell, resident of Williamsport, was the first player in World Series history to hit a home run. 
• Yarrison, Rube - Montgomery
• Veil, Bucky - From Williamsport, Friend of Jimmy Sebring,  they both played in the first World Series in 1903.

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By Town
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"But he was not just generous at Christmas time.  After watching a local sandlot baseball game, he went to Danville and purchased bats, balls and gloves for the children."  - About Frank Delong, in Washingtonville

Bloomsburg 

• The New York Yankees Played the Detroit Tigers, at the Bloomsburg Fair 

Catawissa - 

• Bobby Rhawn

Jamison City 

• "Jamison had a band, they played for picnics, parades and parties. My  grandfather, Metherell, taught the band. They also had a good baseball team. My brother  was bat boy part of the time. Jamison had a fine baseball diamond.  " - Jamison City As I Remember It, from 1900-1917

Mount Caramel

The New York Yankees Played the Detroit Tigers, at Mount Caramel

Selinsgrove:

• Fatmen Vs Leanmen

Sunbury:

• Sunbury once hosted a professional baseball team.  One of the teams had originally started out in Mifflinburg, but moved to Sunbury.
• Some Of The Early History Of Baseball In Sunbury Pa
• Sunbury Shop Team - Industrial League Baseball In Sunbury Pa

Watsontown

• "At a baseball game between the Doodle Dandies, and the Legion 9 Team, the Dandies lost 11-6, breaking their five game winning streak.  Unhappy with the umpires "bad calls", the Brush Brothers threw the Umpire James Garthwaite into the Susquehanna River." - Watsontown's Doodle Dandies

On August 12th 1871 - Union baseball team composed of players from Milton, Watsontown, McEwensville and Turbotville won a series, three out of four, from the starts of Sunbury, which was made up of players from the lower end of the county.  Great excitement over the championship series.

Williamsport:

• Babe Ruth visited Williamsport
• Bases Loaded - Where To Find All Of the LL statues in Williamsport
• Bucky Veil - Played in the 1903 World Series, Alongside Jimmy Sebring
• First Little League World Series
• Outlaws - When the Williamsport Millionaires were Outlaws
• Williamsport Athletic Field
• 
  

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Assorted Stories & Notes
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The Public Press, April 1890

The Wrong Bottle. A Sunbury Base Ball Player Makes a Mistake that Causes Him Some Trouble. From the Sunbury Evening' News:

 The local base ball clubs began to put themselves in trim last week, and on Friday the first practice game took place. Everything went smoothly and the game was an excellent one. The battery of the regular nine was particularly admired, and the curves of Clem Dissinger were too much for the other side-.

Mr. Dissinger sent them in with such rapidity that even the old Frank Eisely, could uot make a hit, and to his utter dismay, the umpire struck hi in out rive successive times. Friday night when Mr. Dissinger was about to retire he found himself so stiff from pitching the game that he scarcely move. lie anticipated this ad had prepared himself with a bottle of Buck Ewing's base ball liniment, and then as he thought, hne applied it to his spine and went to bed much relieved.

In a few hours he was awakened by the terrible smarting of the liniment, and the pains were such as to keep him walking the floor all night. In the morning a member of the family asked him if he had seen anything of the bottle of corn medicine just bought the day before. This aroused Mr. Dissinger's suspicions, and he asked what kind of bottle it was and found that it was one similar to that used for the liniment. The liniment was untouched and be had used about halt of the corn medicine.

The strangest feature about it is that while the remedy is au infallible cure of corns, when applied where there are no corns, it will produce a nice crop of the troublesome little things, and the result of his applying it to his spine is that he now has a beautiful row of full-bloomed corns running up and down his back and they stick out like buttons. They have matured to such an extent that he is using the top one for a collar button and has discarded the use of suspenders. He is trying all sorts of corn cures, and swears that the next time he plays base ball and wants to use the liniment he will be sure to get the right bottle..

In October of 1892, the Northumberland Press surmised that Football would replace Baseball as America's Sport.  Because Football is more dangerous.

1903

"The signing of McCormick ex-o4 by the New York National League Team calls to mind the fact that Bucknell has more men inthe two major leagues than any other college."  McCormick made the 5th, the others being Matthewson, Sebring, Veil, and Barclay.