St. Louis Baseball History: A Guide

INTRODUCTION

In the days before cellphones and online tickets, most Cardinal fans have uttered the line, Meet me at the Musial statue when making plans to go to a game. The statue of Stan Musial is an iconic location in St. Louis baseball. This book explores this and many other locations where St. Louis baseball history took place.

It is a glimpse of St. Louis baseball history. It has to be a glimpse, because St. Louis has a long, rich baseball history. No city, aside from New York City, where the modern game started, has as much baseball history. This book covers people and events from the first documented baseball game under the National Rules in 1860 to the present day.

Each story cites a specific street address and highlights its relevance to baseball history. The addresses include major league ballparks, high school fields, players’ homes and businesses, hotels and cemeteries. Other baseball-related addresses, such as The Sporting News and Rawlings Sporting Goods headquarters, KMOX radio, the trophy shop that supplied Rawlings’ Gold Glove Awards, the church where the Cardinals iconic logo was invented and Babe Ruth’s favorite home of ill-repute, are included. Each story touches on the history of the place or building.

Three suggested tours are included for the explorer who wants to see St. Louis through a baseball lens, some of which are well off the general tourist pathways.

Most people think the history of St. Louis major league teams is simple. The average fan believes the Cardinals have been around since the beginning of time and that there was a team called the Browns, which left for Baltimore a long time ago. The truth is more complicated.

Five major league franchises have called St. Louis home, along with three Negro League teams, now considered major league by Major League Baseball. Two teams were in the National Association, the first fully professional league, but not considered a major league by Major League Baseball. At various times, team names changed and some teams transitioned between leagues, but continuity of ownership and/or players is used to determine when a team is considered part of the same franchise.

For simplicity, I refer to the name that is relevant to the time period of the particular story and to the National Association as a major league. The accompanying table is a handy reference of all the St. Louis major league teams.

For the interested reader who wants to do further research, I highly recommend digging into the sources cited in the bibliography. In particular, the Society of American Baseball Research (SABR) Biographical Project is amazing. The audacious goal of this effort is to complete a four-thousand-word biography on every person who has ever put on a major league uniform. It is an ongoing effort, and so far over five thousand biographies have been completed. I use this resource extensively. Another critical source is Baseball Reference. This online database replaces the pre–internet age baseball encyclopedias and is an incredibly useful engine to provide statistics for today’s baseball researcher.

Finally, I am always interested in feedback on this book and new addresses for my database. Please email me at brianflash100@gmail.com. I will read every note I receive. Additionally, I can provide customized guide services. Drop me a line if you are interested.

1

1860–1899

BASEBALL’S BEGINNING IN ST. LOUIS

Grand Boulevard and Natural Bridge Avenue (Northwest Corner)

Abner Doubleday did not invent baseball in Cooperstown, New York. The game evolved from bat-and-ball games played by children, of which the New York Game eventually dominated. The actual story of the start of baseball is complicated, but a group of gentlemen in New York City codified a set of rules in 1845. These men formed a club, the New York Knickerbockers, and played the New York Nine under these rules on the Elysian Fields in Hoboken, New Jersey, on June 19, 1846.

The game proved popular, but it took time to propagate. In 1857, the first convention of clubs was held and a new set of rules distributed. Other variants of baseball such as the Massachusetts Game and the Philadelphia Game died out. Brooklynite Merritt Griswold, who learned to play the New York game, moved to St. Louis in 1859. He organized the Cyclone Club in St. Louis, and others followed his lead. The Missouri Democrat printed the National Baseball Rules late in 1859. By 1860, there were four clubs in St. Louis learning the New York game.

The Missouri Democrat reported that the Cyclones and the Morning Stars met in Fairgrounds Park on July 9, 1860. This is the first documented baseball game played in St. Louis under the National Rules. The Morning Stars emerged victorious, 49–29. The game was played in a field west of the main amphitheater, approximately across the street from the future location of Beaumont High School.

Fairgrounds Park in 1874. The game in 1860 was played to the west (left) of the round stadium. Missouri Historical Society.

The Bear Pit façade in the southeast corner of the park. Kathryn Flaspohler.

Fairgrounds Park started as a privately owned facility in 1856. It was the site of the annual St. Louis Exposition, an agricultural fair, from 1856 to 1902. The facility had two horse tracks and many other facilities for agricultural displays. A zoo (eventually absorbed by the St. Louis Zoo) was added in 1876. In 1903, the St. Louis Exposition was not held due to preparations for the 1904 World’s Fair. The facility did not revive the exposition after the World’s Fair and closed, hastened by Missouri’s ban on horse-race gambling in 1905.

In 1908, the City of St. Louis bought the park and removed all the old buildings except for the bear pit façade, which survives at the southeast corner of the park. The neighborhoods around the park were the homes of generations of immigrants who played baseball. Professional baseball was played nearby in Sportsman’s Park; this area was the epicenter of amateur baseball in St. Louis. When the St. Louis Cardinals moved downtown and with major demographic changes to the neighborhoods around the park, baseball in the area has mostly disappeared. The fields in the park have been converted to football fields for a new generation of St. Louis children. There are only hints of the old baseball fields, such as distance marker signs on fences.

1861 BASEBALL TODAY

Park Avenue and Missouri Avenue (Southeast Corner)

Lafayette Park is St. Louis’s oldest public park. The thirty-acre park was set aside in an 1836 ordinance to prevent development and dedicated as a city park in 1851. Surrounding the park is the Lafayette Square neighborhood, a historic area filled with well-preserved homes. The statue of Thomas Hart Benton in the park dates to 1868, and the cast-iron fence around the park was installed in 1869. The park sits on a height above the neighborhood. When one looks at the meticulously maintained period homes surrounding the park, it is easy to imagine being here in 1861.

On March 6, 1861, four local baseball clubs, the Cyclones, Morning Stars, Empire and Commercials, met to play for the first time that year. The grounds were rough, causing players to trip and fall when fielding their positions. But the Daily Missouri Republican expected this to be remedied soon, as the Cyclones had petitioned the St. Louis City Council for permission to smooth the grounds at their own expense. That summer featured games between the clubs and other matchups, such as when club members divided according to marital status. One such match on July 4, 1861, resulted in the married men dispatching the bachelors, 55–32.

Lafayette Park in 1875 is seen in this composite of four Compton and Dry map pages. No evidence of a baseball field existed then. Library of Congress.

St. Louis Perfecto Matt Moushey prepares to strike at a toss from a St. Louis Brown Stocking hurler. Kathryn Flaspohler.

An impending play at home. Kathryn Flaspohler.

Lafayette Park was used for amateur ball for a few more years, but the heart of St. Louis baseball was farther north, and the park was improved for other activities. In 2002, baseball returned. The St. Louis Perfectos, a team playing by the rules of the 1860s, was formed and selected the park as its home field. Other local teams followed, and now the St. Louis area is home to a half dozen or so vintage clubs.

A lucky summer weekend visitor may find costumed enthusiasts playing ball on the field in the northwest corner of the park. Pitchers will be tossing the ball underhanded. No one will be wearing gloves. The bats will be wood. With the historic neighborhood surrounding the area, it feels like a trip back in time. To guarantee a glimpse, search online for St. Louis Perfectos vintage baseball to find their schedule. For a special treat, attend the Shepard Barclay Festival the first weekend in June. This features teams from around the Midwest playing games all weekend.

TIME FOR PRO BASEBALL

1111 North Grand Boulevard

In 1867, Union Club president Asa Smith decided the best way to improve St. Louis’s baseball reputation was to develop a great team. In order to have a great team, he needed the best players. Some type of incentive was needed to recruit the best players to his team.

The Union Club put a fence up around a field west of Grand Boulevard. The fence allowed the club to control access and charge admission to its games. The admission fees were used to maintain the grounds and to compensate players.

The box score from the Washington victory. Only two items were noted: HL for hands lost (outs made) and R for runs scored. Daily Missouri Republican, July 23, 1867.

The club played the first game at the enclosed grounds on May 22, 1867. It was an intrasquad exhibition game designed to show off the new park features. On the east side of the grounds, near the Grand Boulevard entrance, the club built a section of covered seats so ladies and their escorts had a good viewing location protected from St. Louis’s summer sun. On the south side of the grounds, open bleachers were available for those hardy patrons who could handle the heat. Home plate was located near the intersection of these two sections of seating and faced northeast.

On July 22, 1867, the first game between a St. Louis team and a big eastern team was held on these grounds. The National Base Ball Club of Washington, D.C., was touring the country and came to St. Louis to meet the Union Club. On a hot day, the Washington team sizzled, defeating the Unions, 113–26. While the Unions were not yet good enough to compete with the elite eastern teams, St. Louis proved a good place for the business of baseball, as about five thousand fans paid to attend the match.

St. Alphonsus Liguori Catholic Church today. Kathryn Flaspohler.

The approximate location of Union Grounds home plate. Kathryn Flaspohler.

Across the street, construction of the St. Alphonsus Liguori Rock Catholic Church began on May 1, 1867, less than a month before the exhibition game, with the cornerstone set on November 3. The church was dedicated five years later. The church is an impressive building, still in use today. In 2007, a lightning strike caused the roof and much of the interior to burn, but it has been rebuilt, and the congregation is still active. Immediately across the street is a vacant lot near where the Union Grounds home plate was located. The rest of the park is now occupied by businesses and homes.

BATTLE BETWEEN THE COLORED SOCKS

701 Compton Avenue

Only fourteen professional games were played at Red Stockings Park, but it is an important location in St. Louis baseball history. This is the southernmost in the string of parks that stretched through midtown and hosted all St. Louis professional teams until Busch Memorial Stadium opened in 1966. This key spot hosted the first professional league game in St. Louis in 1875.

The National Association, the first fully professional baseball league, formed in 1871. St. Louis did not have a team in the association until two teams signed up in 1875. St. Louis’s first two entries into the National Association had very different beginnings. The St. Louis Brown Stockings were formed because local boosters were tired of amateur St. Louis teams being beaten by the professional Chicago White Stockings, the forerunner of the Chicago Cubs. In 1874, the White Stockings won all fourteen games played against the best St. Louis amateur teams by the combined score of 272–67. J.B.C. Lucas II, a wealthy real estate developer, was named president of the Brown Stockings and led the fundraising effort. Campbell Orrick Bishop, a wealthy St. Louis businessman and baseball aficionado, took the $20,000 raised and recruited players from Brooklyn and Philadelphia to play for St. Louis.

Compton and Dry map view of Red Stockings Park in 1875 (no.