While Ed Achorn was in town, we went to the Mercantile Library to do a bit of digging around and Ed found a reference in the Western Manuscript Collection to "the Von der Ahe building." I went and dug it up and found the above picture.
According to the description on the back of the image, this building stood at the corner of Grand and St. Louis, which would have put it right across the street from Sportsmans Park. Also, it stated that the building was used by Chris Von der Ahe as the Browns' office during the 1880s. Sadly, the building was torn down in the 1930s.
It was, without a doubt, one of our better finds over two days of digging through archives. I'll mention a few of the other things that I found but was unable to get digital images of and, therefore, am unable to show you. At the Missouri Historical Museum's Research Center, I found a photo of Ferdinand Garesche, the shortstop for the antebellum Cyclone Club. Also, while there, I held a stock certificate for the 1875 Brown Stockings in my hand. They also had a great picture of a reunion of St. Louis baseball pioneers that was held at a game in the 1920s. In the picture was Shepard Barclay, Bill Kelsoe, James Fitzgibbons, and others. The museum also had a rain check signed by Chris Von der Ahe from the early 1890s. They had a lot of cool stuff and I'm going to have to go back and get digital images of all of everything as soon as I can because I want you to see it.
Tomorrow, I'm going to post some information that I found there about the West Ends.
No comments:
Post a Comment