CHAPTER ELEVEN

TOWN BASEBALL

After the war, George was principal of the schools in Perry and Kingfisher, Oklahoma, and when he came home for summer vacations, he would get our tennis and baseball programs started.

One year, he brought each of us a new baseball. When he tried to get the team started, there were no balls in town, so he turned Indian Giver and took our balls for practice, until a supply arrived from Nashville.

George had a knack of developing young players, and he fielded some pretty good teams. I remember his outfield one year was Little Jack Allen in left, Joe Bell in center, and Auburn Hobson in right. Lee Gothard played shortstop and a boy named Fowler played first. I can't recall the second and third basemen. Charlie Evins did a lot of the pitching. He had a great drop curve -- hit me on the foot with it one day.

Stokley Adcock was a fine catcher, although he may not have caught for this particular team. He batted left-handed, and could wear the ball out. He had gotten some gas in the war, and on long hits, frequently had to stop at second base. He and Bernard Summers were older than the others, and didn't play all the time.

Bernard played first base, and was a big raw-boned, left-handed batter. The diamond on the campus had a huge oak tree deep on the right field line. I saw Bernard hit a ball completely over that tree for a trot-around home run. The other team said it was foul, and walked off the field.

Jack Allen and Joe Bell were good fielders, and Joe was a fine hitter. One day he hit a long shot to deep right center that would have cleared the wire fence on the first bounce and rolled to the creek. I was one of several spectators standing in the outfield near the fence. I stopped the ball and flipped it back to the opposing center fielder, and Joe had to stop at second base. I could never figure out why I did such a stupid thing. When Joe came back to the outfield, he really gave me a going over. Fortunately for me, we won the game by a big score.

Auburn Hobson was a fine hitter and a spectacular fielder. As a matter of fact, he would make the easy ones look hard when he could. Nothing was more exciting than watching him run hard to his right for a low line drive, backhand the ball, turn two flips and come up with the ball held high above his head. You couldn't call them accidents, for he did it to often.

He lived south of town, and frequently stayed the night with us before and after a game. I'll bet he remembers that pretty brass bedstead in Mom's company bedroom.

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Striped silk shirts were the rage, and Auburn and George had their share of them; which reminds me of a particular ball game with McMinnville.

They had a former pro pitcher named Buckshot Martin, who was still a good athlete. They brought him to play that day, but agreed he would not pitch against our youngsters. It was a tight low scoring game, and about the fourth inning, they put Buckshot in the box.

For the next few innings, we couldn't get the ball out of the infield. They made an error in the eighth which enabled us to tie the score at 2 to 2. We held them in the ninth, when, with the bases full and two out, Hobbie made one of his patented catches near the fence.

In the last of the ninth, Jack Allen scratched a hit to short. E. J. Evans went in to run for him. You see, E. J. was a Vanderbilt boy, and had learned to steal bases with the best of them. I can see him now, long arms stretched to their fullest extent, rocking back and forth as he prepared to rocket away.

Buckshot didn't know what he was up against. His first ball was high and outside. He hesitated half a second, and then came down the middle with his second pitch. E. J. was long gone, and slid into second well ahead of the catcher's throw.

With the count one and one, the batter laid down a good sacrifice and E. J. was on third, with only one away. It looked real good! Then, it looked real bad, for the next batter struck out swinging at three of Buckshot's best. Two down and a weak hitter at bat.

George had been coaching at third. He flashed a quick signal to E. J., and came to the plate to pinch-hit, silk shirt and all. He swung wildly at the first pitch, and prayed Buckshot would come in with the second. He did, right down the gut, and George laid down the prettiest bunt toward third base I have ever seen, before or since.

E. J. was halfway home when the ball hit the bat, and had crossed the plate by the time the third baseman had picked it up. To make the run good, however, George had to beat the throw by a step.

And so, two city-slickin college boys had done the old master in. I never could understand why they let George in the game in civilian clothes. I guess they were just not squeamish in those days about such things.

We were not so fortunate at Sparta. Earl Webb had been an outfield star for the Cubs for years and had just retired. He pitched for Sparta that day, and chipped in with a couple of long home runs. We couldn't hit his southpaw stuff at all -- he shut us out. I try not to remember how many they made.

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Probably the greatest baseball ever played in Middle Tennessee was our famous five game series with Liberty, in late summer of 1922.

Both teams brought in outsiders from other towns, and we also enlisted the two older Hobson boys, Wilson and Thurman, who were fine players but not as agile as their little brother.

The first game was played on a Monday in Smithville, on the new diamond on the Nashville highway, about a mile beyond the mill.

Joe Puckett from Silver Point had been pitching well for us all summer. He pitched the first game and we won, about four to two.

We went to Liberty for the second game, and Frank Bratton turned us inside out -- one to zero.

The series moved back to Smithville for the third game. The outside players were growing in number, and helped us win that one.

We went back to Liberty for the fourth game, and you didn't know the players without a score card. They won.

That brought it down to the fifth game, which was scheduled for Dowelltown. By this game, the outsiders had taken over. Liberty had players from Auburntown, Tullahoma, and Shelbyville, and we had them from Cookville, Murfreesboro and Gordonsville, plus the battery from Vanderbilt.

A pitcher from Gordonsville was going to play third base for us -- seems like his name was Beasley. He was a fine all around athlete with a great arm. I heard the boys before game time say he could throw a runner out from third to first in the time space of three steps. Auburn Hobson played right field; otherwise, all our players were outsiders.

This was not a great game. Liberty was the home team, and at the end of the fifth inning, the score was something like four to three in our favor. In the first of the sixth, we put on a rally. We scored two runs, filled the bases again and then one of our boys hit a long shot down the right field line. The umpire called "fair ball", and the base paths looked like a track meet. Liberty yelled "foul ball" and after considerable wrangling and a few boxing matches, they walked off the field, trailing ten to three. The umpire forfeited the game to Smithville, and we went home champions; unsatisfied, but champions, nonetheless.

I would like to know what happened to Joe Puckett. He had a great arm, and could really pop that leather. I have seen him throw flies to the outfielders to warm them up before pitching a game. If he didn't ruin his arm, I have an idea he pitched successfully in professional ball; he surely had the ability.

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