At the game between the two St. Louis clubs last Sunday [the day after game six], an immense floral tribute was presented to the champions. Mike Kelly was one of the spectators at the game, and he consented to make the presentation. Here is his speech: "Ladies and Gentlemen-it is my honor on this occasion to present to your champion club this floral tribute. They have earned it. They have beaten our club-the Chicago club-fairly (great applause), and they have beat us on the rattle. (More applause.) I can say that you have treated us well here, and we hope to meet you again in the future." (Cheers.)
-Boston Daily Globe, October 28, 1886
2 comments:
Its nice to see that St. Louis fans were classy even in 1886!
Kelly was certainly being kind to the StL fans in his speech. He was a smart guy and played to his audience. But the reality, from what I can tell, is that the StL fans were not particularly kind to the Chicagos. StL had a rough crowd in the 19th century and, while I can't really speak intelligently about what a lot of the other crowds were like, I would say that the StL crowd was as rough as it got. I know the NY crowds were pretty rough in the 1860s but the combination of cheaper tickets, the drinking, the gambling crowd, etc made it pretty tough on the visiting teams in StL.
Still, the speech was a nice touch by Kelly and was rather magnanimous.
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