Allandale Field – Asheville’s Rough Hillside Mountain Diamond
The Asheville Baseball Club has bounced in, out, and around the North Carolina town for over 130 years, perpetually seeking a home within an ever-evolving urban landscape. In 1892, the club’s ballpark was off Depot Street on a lot south of the Glen Rock Hotel. The...
Billy Laval’s Spartanburg Red Sox and the Bad Series at Rock Hill
Billy Laval's passion was coaching college football. Between 1915 and 1949, Laval's teams compiled a record of 168 wins, 136 losses, and 17 ties, taking home three Southern Intercollegiate Athletic Association championships. In 2009 the Columbia State newspaper...
Shoeless Miller, Greensboro’s Green Recruit
Frank Doyle, manager of the Greensboro Patriots, had a new recruit. His name was Miller and somebody had dug him up down in South Carolina. A couple of weeks before, pitching for a team in Greer, he’d struck out 13 of the big mill workers from Easely. Someone said...
Spartanburg’s Unique Carolina Association Ballpark
Spartanburg, South Carolina, is sited on the Piedmont Plateau between the more crowded civilizations of Charlotte and Greenville. Thomas Wolfe, in Look Homeward, Angel, described Spartanburg as a "sleepy junction" within a "hot baked autumnal land, rolling piedmont...
The Glorious Life of a Class D Ballplayer in 1909
Excerpts from the in-progress biography of Jack Corbett entitled The Book About Jack Corbett and a Lot of Other Stuff. Corbett began the 1909 season playing for the Charleston Sea Gulls of the Class C South Atlantic League. A good infielder who was outmatched by Class...
Robbery in the Park and the Attack on Umpire Bailey
The following is an excerpt from the in-progress biography of Jack Corbett entitled, The Book About Jack Corbett and a Lot of Other Stuff. The incident occurred in Columbia, South Carolina, on the afternoon of June 11, 1909, following a minor league baseball game...
The Book About Jack Corbett and a Lot of Other Stuff – Part 1
The Name on the Base Jack Corbett's best friend is Jack Corbett; his ideal, Jack Corbett; his criterion, Jack Corbett; and his hero, Jack Corbett… It has been said that we must judge a man by the enemies he makes. Corbett has plenty of them, but it is safe to say that...
The Semi-Pro: The Baseball Life of Walter Ancker (Chapter Two)
Chapter 1:The Kid Flinger (1915) Chapter 2:Look Homeward, Angel (1916) ---- The names of five students in the Connie Mack School of Baseball Knowledge were erased from the rolls of the Athletics. The quintet disposed of and their new places of abode are: Pitcher...
The Semi-Pro: The Baseball Life of Walter Ancker (Chapter One)
Chapter 1:The Kid Flinger Walter Ancker, the star pitcher of the Tenafly, N.J., team of the North Jersey league, is the latest kid flinger to be caught in Cornelius McGillicuddy's dragnet. Ancker, who is a Closter, N.J., lad, yesterday signed a two-year contract with...
Aunt Edith’s House
The old woman we called Granny was my great grandmother, and Aunt Edith was her oldest child. Edith was born in Minnesota in 1894, probably near Lower Red Lake or Leech Lake. Granny's husband, Dr. George Davidson, was a physician with the Bureau of Indian Affairs and...
