Monday, December 31, 2007

The Reds Play The Nationals

Saturday afternoon, April 24 (1875), the St. Louis Red Stocking Baseball Club (the McNeary Reds) played against the St. Louis Nationals at the Compton Avenue Park...and defeated them by 35 to 14...The club was represented that afternoon by its strongest team-Dillon, Blong, Morgan, Houts, Sweasy (formerly of the famous Cincinnati champion Red Stockings), Croft, Oran, Redmond, and McSorley, all men of national reputation then or later. The Nationals, all amatuers, were from well known St. Louis families. Bopp and Boles were the battery that day. Lee Funkhouser, a Princeton cum laude graduate and brother of the late Dr. Robert M. Funkhouser, covered first base and made three of the runs credited to the amateurs. My report of the game in the Times says that "the fielding of the Nationals was done mainly by Jackson, Lee, McCreery and Funkhouser," the three first named covering respectively third, short and second. In the outfield was Wickham (a brother of Judge Wickham, if I remember rightly, or it may have been the judge himself). The best batting for the amateurs was done by Boles with three hits, and he also made a couple of their fourteen runs.

-From A Newspaper Man's Motion-Picture of the City

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