Neighborhood Baseball 1949

Last week I wrote a post about returning to Beverly, Massachusetts for a Veteran's Day celebration to rededicate Healy Square for my ancestor Joseph Edwin Healey.   The ceremony was published in the 12 November 2011 issue of the Salem News, and seen by many friends and family members in Beverly and nearby towns.  I was pleasantly surprised to hear from my Dad's old friend, Bill Poole, who still lives in Beverly.

When I was growing up on Dearborn Avenue, I lived in the same house my Dad grew up in.  His mother lived in that same house when her family immigrated from Leeds, Yorkshire, England in 1915.  Four generations of Wilkinsons lived at #7 Dearborn Avenue.  My Dad had many great memories of the neighborhood, and most of them revolve around playing baseball at Avery Field.  This field is now gone, since there is a housing project there now.  When my Dad was growing up it was a vacant lot at the end of Dearborn Avenue.   Bill Poole lived at #17 Dearborn Avenue.   I remember playing with his daughter Carolyn, who was my age.

middle row

Tom Kelley, Bruce Miller, Dick Woodbury, Bill Lord, Jack Wilkinson, Ted Margolis, 

Bill Poole, Jr., Jordan Baker, Jim Hoar, 

front row

John Sheeny, Bob Marsella

back row

Bill Poole, Sr., ? Egan, Brad Rushworth, Bill Ottley, Frank Driscoll, 

Billy Pinkerton, Bob Burchstead, Hardy Nicola

Bill Poole sent me a nice email when he saw my photo in the Salem News, and he has exchanged a few messages with me over the weekend.  One of them included this photograph dated 5 September 1949 and labeled "the last game played on Avery Field".  It shows the two teams for a Boys vs Men baseball game.  My Dad also remembers playing games against the boys from other neighborhoods, including Prospect Hill, where my godfather lived.  My Dad has passed away, but I still hear about those games from my godfather!

My Dad is the 14 year old boy with sunglasses, Jack Wilkinson, fourth from the left in the middle row.

Bill Poole said in his message that "...it was the last of many fun filled games that brought the neighborhood together...".  I remember the same nostalgic tone my Dad had in his voice when he reminisced about those days.

There is a note on the back of this photo
"Avery Field before a 'Mens-Boys' baseball game, August 1949"

This is the fun part of having a blog!  You never know who will contact you next!

First photograph courtesy of Bill Poole, Beverly, Massachusetts.
Second photograph courtesy of my uncle Richard Wilkinson, Long Beach, California

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To cite/link to this blog post:  Heather Wilkinson Rojo, "Neighborhood Baseball 1949", Nutfield Genealogy, posted November 18, 2011, ( https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2011/11/neighborhood-baseball-1949.html: accessed [access date]). 

Draper and Maynard Sports Equipment

In 1881 Jason F. Draper and John Maynard established a glove factory in Plymouth, New Hampshire.  In 1882 they began producing baseball gloves and supplied major league teams.  By the 1920s 90% of the major league teams were using equipment from Draper-Maynard.  The company was bought and sold many times over the years, and it is now the D&M Co. of Tokyo, Japan, which was not aware of its connection with Draper-Maynard “until they did research for their centennial celebration in 2001.”  [see the NH Historical Society webpage http://www.nhhistory.org/baseballquiz/baseball4.html]   There is also a new company named Draper-Maynard producing vintage reproduction baseball jackets and gloves, and it uses the original “Lucky Dog” trademark of Jason Draper’s bird dog, Nick.

At the height of the Great Depression my uncle Robert Wilkinson was just a kid, and the oldest boy in the family.  His uncle invited him up to visit Plymouth, New Hampshire.  This uncle was George Herbert Adams, but he was known by the strange nickname of Cupe Adams, and he was more of a first cousin once removed.  Cupe was married to Inez Perkins, daughter of Elizabeth Bill, my great grandmother’s sister.   Cupe was a graduate of Dartmouth College, and the treasurer at Draper-Maynard Company.

So Robert and my grandmother were picked up by a chauffeur from their home in Beverly, Massachusetts and driven to the Adams summer home on Squam Lake, where they were treated like royalty.  The height of the weekend was a tour of the Draper-Maynard factory where the sports equipment was made in nearby Plymouth.  Uncle Robert, who is not longer alive, was only about ten years old, and thought he had died and gone to heaven.  There were not many  toys in the house where he grew up with my Dad, and the whole neighborhood shared bats, gloves and balls for baseball, football and other sports.   Uncle Cupe took a basket and filled it with bats, balls of all types, gloves, hats, helmets and other goodies for the overawed little cousin.  When Robert returned to Dearborn Avenue in Beverly he was the neighborhood hero, especially to his two little brothers!

1913 Draper & Maynard
Spring and Summer Catalog

Uncle Robert never forgot his benevolent Adams relatives, and they were kind to the whole family over the years.  Inez (Perkins) Adams was a house mother for a girl’s dorm at Plymouth State Normal School, which is now known as Plymouth State University, and she was a favorite cousin.  Everyone remembered her as a particularly nice person.  When my grandmother was a newlywed English bride to my Yankee grandfather, cousin Inez helped her to learn all about her new relatives.   The original Draper-Maynard factory building was bought in 1992 by Plymouth State University and is now the art department. 

Genealogy:

Generation 1.  Caleb Rand Bill, born 30 May 1833 in Nictaux, Nova Scotia, son of Reverend Ingraham Ebenezer Bill and Isabella Lyons, died on 30 December 1902 in Salem, Massachusetts; married on 7 June 1858 in Lunenburg, Nova Scotia to Annie Margaret Bollman, daughter of Bremner Frederick Bollman and Sarah Elizabeth Lennox, born on 11 September 1835 in Lunenburg, died in 1923 in Salem, Massachusetts. Nine children including my Great Grandmother, Isabella Lyons Bill, born January 1863 in Machias, Maine.

Generation 2.  Elizabeth T. Bill, sister to Isabella (above), born September 1866 in Houlton, Maine; married on 26 December 1892 in Salem, Massachusetts to Charles Foster Perkins as his first wife.  Two children.

Generation 3.  Inez Margaret B. Perkins, born 26 April 1893 in Salem, died August 1966 in Houston, Texas; married in 1915 to George Herbert Adams, Jr., born 12 April 1890 in Plymouth, New Hampshire, son of George Herbert Adams and Sarah Katherine Smith, died 4 November 1943.  One son.

Generation 4. George Herbert Adams, III, born 28 July 1916, died on 7 January 1990, married with at least one son also named George Herbert Adams. 

I wonder if the nickname “Cupe” was passed along to all the other George Herbert Adams?

http://draper-maynard.com/  Draper- Maynard website for reproduction vintage sports equipment

http://www.la84foundation.org/SportsLibrary/BBM/1912/bbm96ad.pdf   “The Draper-Maynard Co., Manufacturers of Sporting Goods”    from the sports library archives at La84foundation.org

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To cite/link to this blog post: Heather Wilkinson Rojo, "Draper and Maynard Sports Equipment", Nutfield Genealogy, posted August 8, 2011, ( https://nutfieldgenealogy.blogspot.com/2011/08/draper-and-maynard-sports-equipment.html: accessed [access date]). 

Baseball and Genealogy Research

Red Sox outfielder, Dom DiMaggio (brother to the more famous Joe DiMaggio), and current San Francisco Giant closer Brian Wilson both resided in Londonderry, New Hampshire. Brian Wilson, “The Bearded One” is well known recently for his popularity during the 2010 World Series. As a teenager Brian played baseball for the local American Legion team in Londonderry. Newspapers and online resources such as sports blogs are the easiest way to research famous baseball players from your own hometown.

George Edward “Duffy” Lewis is buried in the Holy Cross Catholic Cemetery in Londonderry. He played for the Red Sox, Yankees and Senators from 1910 to 1921. He died in Salem, New Hampshire on 17 June 1979. This was a big story back in 2000 when John Clayton, reporter for the Manchester Union Leader newspaper, wrote two articles about Duffy and mentioned how his grave was unmarked. Money was raised from readers for a nice marker, engraved with his wife’s name, too. The Union Leader is available on microfilm in the Manchester public library.

This got me to thinking about researching baseball in the family. Sure, there were lots of members of the family, male and female, who played on school, youth, town and local teams. I remembered that in my own family tree James Ebenezer Ferrin (1848–1935) was an early organizer of baseball teams in Essex County, Massachusetts. He did a lot to make the game popular in Massachusetts. He was also famous around town for witnessing General Lee surrender at Appomattox, and was the last surviving veteran of the Civil War in Peabody, Massachusetts. This information came from a few lines I read in the book Capt. Jonathan Farren of Amesbury and some of his Descendants published in 1941.

I knew that David Lambert of the New England Historic Genealogical Society was a big baseball fan, so I asked him about researching early baseball. I was interested in finding out more information on James Ebenezer Ferrin. He recommended the website http://www.retrosheet.org/ or an inquiry to the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, New York.

James E. Ferrin was not listed at the http://www.retrosheet.org/ website. The Baseball Hall of Fame was very accommodating, and answered several email inquiries, but had no information on early baseball in Essex County, Massachusetts. They suggested several Massachusetts baseball researchers who specialized in the time period, and to look in newspaper articles in the 1860s and 1870, right after the Civil War, when baseball was becoming popular. So far I haven’t found much, but then again, I haven’t found any other information at all on James Ferrin – no marriage, no descendants, end of the line? I’ll continue to look, because Essex County is a big place, and there were a lot of little newspapers all over at that time period.

For early baseball see SABR (Society for American Baseball Research) http://sabr.org/

Baseball Biography Project Website: http://bioproj.sabr.org/

Duffy Lewis’s Biography
http://bioproj.sabr.org/bioproj.cfm?a=v&v=l&bid=1691&pid=8220

Dom DiMaggio’s Biography
http://bioproj.sabr.org/bioproj.cfm?a=v&v=l&bid=1471&pid=3606

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Copyright 2010, Heather Wilkinson Rojo