Early baseball in Washington/Game 10
From SABR Encyclopedia
| Spread of baseball: Home -> Washington -> Early baseball in Washington/Game 10 |
| Location | Washington |
|---|---|
| Year | 1878 |
| Month | 7 |
| Date | 4 |
| City | Seattle |
| State | WA |
| Country | USA |
| Site | Duwamish Race Track |
| Modern address | Fort Dent, Tukwila, WA |
| Was NY rules baseball | Likely |
| Played by | Locals |
| Team 1 | Seattle Alkis |
| Team 2 | Victoria |
| Found by | Mark Brunke |
Sources: [Original Source] The Seattle Times, Sunday, September 7, 1947. “Seattle's First Baseball Games”. ; The Seattle Times, February 1, 1931. “First Busher Talks”.; The Seattle Times, February 24, 1922. “Do You Remember When-”.; The Seattle Times, Thursday, August 11, 1955. “The First Record”. Also, materials pulled from online historical information, including Ancestry.com, The Internet Archive, and various historical societies in the Pacific Northwest. These include WPA journals of early pioneers, interviews, and remembrances.
[Referenced Source] Initial source is The Seattle Times, Sunday, September 7, 1947. “Seattle's First Baseball Games.” Submitted by Mark Brunke Article Transcription and/or image file of article
Historical Note: Loren Bingham "Lote" Hastings was from Port Townsend, and had played in the game already noted in Port Townsend for May 13, 1871. Sam Crawford's family had moved to Seattle from Olympia, and was originally from Oregon City, where organized baseball was being played in 1866. In a 'Pioneer Recollection' published on the early settlers of Olympia, Washington in 1914, Crawford relays that he played baseball as a young man in Olympia and took the implements of the game with him from there to Seattle. Warren, Wilson, Conover, and Crawford all report that baseball wasn't played in Seattle until Crawford brought his bat and ball to town. However, each reporter does take credit for being the person who answered the challenge to the Newcastles, and thus organized the Alkis. Each report also indicates that Crawford regularly practced on Occidental Square, and that each member knew several other people who knew how to play baseball. In other words, this was a game each person brought with them from whereever they came from. Other reports indicate baseball was already being played in the Willamette Valley by 1856, and teams were organized in Oregon City as early as 1866, Walla Walla by 1867, and Boise by 1868. The report in Walla Walla's Statesman from 1867 states 'there is scarce a one horse town without a baseball team.' We can presume this to be generally true given the popularity of baseball in the locations these residents were migrating from.
The photograph appearing with this article was also published by The Seattle Times on February 1,1931 and prior to that on February 24, 1922.
The Seattle Times, Sunday, September 7, 1947 Sunday Magazine, page 3
Seattle's First Baseball Games
by Margaret Pitcairn Strachan Seattle Times, September 7, 1947
Photo 1 caption: Jack Wilson, one of the founders of Seattle baseball, photographed recently at his Colville home. - Photo by courtesy Seattle Historical Society
Photo 2 caption: First Baseball Team in Seattle, the Alkis, who pioneered the game here in the years 1876 to 1879. Players shown are: front row (left to right)- Ed Coryell, James Warren, Curry Chase, Jack Wilson (who is quoted in the accompanying article) and Sam Crawford. Back row-Ed Briscoe, George Rudge, Manager Jack Levy, Lote Hastings, George Snow.
BASEBALL became popular in Seattle as far back as 1876, when Samuel Crawford came to townwith his baseball and bat. At odd times he'd go out on Occidental Square and pass the ball around. The following year, Jack Wilson, a professional ball player, arrived. Crawford was editor of The Weekly Intelligencer and ran an article stating that the coal miners at Newcastle wanted to play any nine on the Pacific Coast, Seattle preferred. Wilson called on Crawford and the two got a team together and sent word to Newcastle that they were ready. Thus Seattle's first ball team came to life! What happened at that game is well remembered by Seattle's pioneer pitcher, Wilson. He writes from his home at Colville, "The game was played on the old University grounds, that being only piece of ground anywhere to be had. The game ended in the seventh inning by the Newcastle boys throwing down their clubs and quitting, a most digusted lot! They never made a score. I was sure Curry Chase (the catcher) and I could beat them alone and they knew virtually nothing about baseball."
THE Seattle team was called the Alkis. Wilson says, "We went to Victoria on the Queen's Birthday and played the Victoria Boys on Beacon Hil, beating them nearly as easily as the coal miners. We went on the Steamer North Pacific, with Captain Clancy." When the Alkis returned from that first trip to Victoria, the entire town met them at thelanding andWilson was carried down the plank on someone's shoulders. "Then on July 4," Wilson writesw, "Victoria came to Seattle and we played on the fair grounds, up the Duwamish River a few miles from Seattle. A special train was run, and there was a big crowd. "No record was kept of the number of spectators at the early games, but I'm sure most all Seattle was there, either sitting on the University steps or, if they couldn't find a convenient stump, sitting right on the ground. No admissions was asked-we played for the fun of it. "In 1878 we went to Victoria again and Victoria won. Chase had left the country and I had the thumb on my right hand cut off coupling cars, so could not pitch." Wilson left Seattle in the spring of 1879, going to Walla Walla and joining a cattle drive to Wyoming. He returned to New York, and it was not until 20 years later that hecame back to Seattle. For a number of years, he owned a harware store at Kettle Falls. Today, almost 90 years old, he follows Seattle baseball by reading the sports pages at his more at Colville.
In the Daily Pacific Tribune of July 1, 1878, appeared a paragraph headed "Ball Ground," which said, "The county prisoners having no other work on hand, were sent out to D. T. Denny's place, in the northern part of town, last week, and put to work fixing up a baseball ground for the benefit of the boys." The following day the announcement appeared of a game to be played between the University and the Alki Junior clubs on the Fourth of July. The game was played and the Alkis won by the score of 47 to 35. If Seattleites couldn't get their baseball at home, they could do so by taking an excursion on Puget Sound, for a newspaper of August9, 1882, had this item wedged in among other notes of local interest: "On Sunday the Steamer Nellie took the Snohomish baseball nine over to Seabeck to contest the Port Gamble club." Port Gamble won-28 to 8. A return game was promised for the following Sunday and it was said "The winners will carry off the uniforms of the vanquished as a trophy of success.
Another newspaper, for August 3, 1886, said, "Shoshone Baseball Club arrived from Portland last evening and are quartered at the Arlington Hotel. They are a fine, athletic set of young men. They meet the Seattle Club on the diamond in two games, the first this afternoon and the second tomorrow, and on both of these occasions will present their strongest team, including Mr. Hill, the catcher, injured in Portland, but who has fully recovered, and will support their fine pitcher, Devine. . . .The first train will leave at 3 p. m. Sharp and the next at 3:30 and the game will be called at 4 o'clock." The account of the that game appeared in the next day's paper. The "fine, athletic set of young men" beat Seattle by one point-the score 6 to 5. Both grandstands were overflowing and "The Reds (Seattle) wore their new uniforms, consisting of white shirt and pants, maroon stockings and belt and white cap with band to match belt." The Shoshones also were in red and wore rubber slippers. The following year, a story in The Daily Press told of a forthcoming game between Seattle and the Newcastles, and mentioned their long rivalry for the championship of King County. The Seattle baseball enthusiasts were disappointed when the game turned out to be a walk-away for the Newcastle nine. The score was 16-2 when the game ended at the eighth inning. When 1888 rolled around, the Seattle team had been rechristened The Browns and The Daily Press, June 6, said a purse of $200 had been contributed for the winning team in a three-game match between the San Francisco club and the home team.
Four hundred fans attended the first game and the Browns won, 9 to 5. In the second game, the Browns lost, 10 to 12, and it must have been a sad defeat, for 1,200 to 1,500 fans were there shouting for them. The paper said, "Both pitchers were hit freely and with effect." The third game went only to five innings when the Westerns, as San Francisco was called, "threw up the sponge," not having been able to score, and Seattle having eight runs. By 1890, baseball news rated a column, although it was tucked away on the last page of the paper. The Seattle Telegraph of August 14 of that year tells of the Seattle Club mopping up the diamond with the Spokanes. Four days later, Spokane staged a comeback and beat Seattle, 12 to 5.
Seattle and Spokane were great rivals again in 1910, when The Seattle Times reported on August 1, "Spokane opened here this afternoon for a series of seven games. Spokane is leading the procession while Seattle is resting comfortably in last place, but for all that, these seven games will be fought to a finish. "Northwestern League attendance figures, which were shown for the first time at the meeting of the moguls at Seattle, show Spokane up in a very unfavorable light. Attendance all over the circuit has diminished appreciably, and a bare margin of $15 per game is all that separates Spokane from the lowest notch. Tacoma holds that honor. The worst feature of the whole proceedings, from a Spokane standpoint, is that Vancouver has averaged exactly $115 more per game than that city. Seattle is considerably ahead of Vancouver. This is disagreeable news to the Spokane boosters, who have been touting that city as being next to Seattle as a baseball center." The arrival of D. E. Dugdale in Seattle in 1898 put this city on the baseball map. He organized the old Northwest League and built Dugdale Park, in Rainier Valley. Recent history of baseball is known to most fans. Dugdale sold the Indians to William Klepper in 1920 and Emil Sick and associates took over in January, 1938. Dugdale Park burned to the ground in 1931.
Seattle's pop. in 1880 was about 3,500.
Sources
Sources: [Original Source] The Seattle Times, Sunday, September 7, 1947. “Seattle's First Baseball Games”. ; The Seattle Times, February 1, 1931. “First Busher Talks”.; The Seattle Times, February 24, 1922. “Do You Remember When-”.; The Seattle Times, Thursday, August 11, 1955. “The First Record”. Also, materials pulled from online historical information, including Ancestry.com, The Internet Archive, and various historical societies in the Pacific Northwest. These inclue WPA journals of early pioneers, interviews, and remembrances.
