The Old Ball Game

Story by Leonard Felson | Photos courtesy of the Hartford Dark Blues

Craig Hotchkiss grew up in West Hartford, and like a lot of boys in the 1960s, he played baseball, making it all the way to Babe Ruth ball, which, to those not in the know, means serious baseball.

He graduated from Hall High School when it was still in West Hartford Center, Class of 1970 – the last to graduate before the new campus opened in its present location off North Main Street. So you might think Hotchkiss’ days of playing baseball would be a thing of the past. You’d be right, but not in the way you might think.

For Hotchkiss still plays baseball, but he plays a game far in the past, often called “vintage base ball” (with the game spelled as two words.) It’s a sport that resembles today’s game the way Shakespearean English resembles today’s vernacular. To a spectator, it looks much like today’s baseball, but the uniforms are like those worn in the 19th century and the rules adhere to that period as well, one of the most obvious being that the men don’t use gloves.

Hotchkiss, who now lives in Bloomfield, isn’t the only player with West Hartford roots who plays the vintage ball. Tim Zeuschner, who grew up in Windsor but now calls West Hartford home, is another avid player of the old-fangled game, although he’s been relegated to the disabled list after a car accident that put his playing days on hold, most likely for good.

Nevertheless, ask either man about what it’s like to be a part of Hartford Dark Blues vintage base ball club and you’ll hear tales that take you back to another era. You’ll also understand what motivates a group of men who range in age from 20something to 60something to continue to play a sport that most give up after high school or when their muscles no longer serve them during weekend softball games.

“It’s the fraternal angle,” says Hotchkiss, a former social studies teacher at South Windsor High School who left to become program director of the Mark Twain House in Hartford. That’s fitting since Twain watched at least one of the original Hartford Dark Blues’ “matches,” as the games were called, on a field that’s now next to the Church of the Good Shepherd on Wyllys Street in Hartford.

Zeuschner, who met Hotchkiss at South Windsor High and remains a social studies teacher there, got involved in the game largely though a fellow teacher, Greg Frank, who recruited many of the department’s male teachers and made them teammates. Like others involved in vintage base ball, Frank’s interest stemmed in part from a parallel interest in historical re-enactments of Civil War encampments.

Zeuschner wasn’t so much interested in historic re-enactments as he was in another opportunity to play ball.

“I played slow-pitch softball for a lot of years before I got married and for a few years after,” says Zeuschner. “Then the kids came and it became difficult to commit to two to three games a weekend.” In contrast, the vintage base ball season is spread out with usually no more than a few games a month, which becomes more manageable than weekly softball games.

Zeuschner, who played for three years, usually caught behind the plate or played first base, although once he broke his pinky finger after misjudging a ball coming toward him, one of the risks of playing gloveless.

For players like Zeuschner and Hotchkiss, the game allows them to see history come alive again.

“Baseball originates from ball-stick games from Britain,” says Hotchkiss, who also notes historical evidence of the game in colonial Massachusetts when it was known as the “Massachusetts game” or “town ball,” set in an agrarian society where there were no out-of-bounds and it could be played on a town green.

Beginning in the 19th century in New York, the largest metropolitan area in the country, another game with different rules began to develop. It attracted urban professionals and craftsmen who belonged to bachelor organizations as a way to affirm their gentlemanly status, says Hotchkiss. Before industrialization, most men, of course, worked on their own farms, and that was seen as a way of demonstrating one’s manhood. But as men turned to work in offices and shops, and often without being owners of the business, they sought other ways to assert their manhood. The game played in New York, called base ball, was just one of the ways. The Civil War exposed more men to the game. When the war ended, and as expansion westward continued, the game spread increasingly becoming a national pastime.

Around the same time, the amateur nature of the teams, most of which grew out of fraternal clubs, added a professional level. Among the cities sporting professional teams was Hartford, a thriving industrial city during and after the Civil War. The team, called the Hartford Dark Blues, was part of the National Association, the roots of today’s National League. In its second year, the team came in second place behind the Boston Red Stockings with a record of 54 wins and 28 losses. That performance got the Dark Blues an invitation to join the new league, which included teams from St. Louis, Chicago, Cincinnati, Philadelphia, Boston, New York and Hartford.

Fast-forward to the 21st century, and the team that Hotchkiss and Zeuschner play for is the Hartford Dark Blues, or at least a re-enactment of the team, which had its glory days between 1874 and 1877. (Another vintage base ball team in the region includes the Hartford Senators, a minor league team from the early 20th century, which included such great players as Lou Gehrig, Hank Greenberg and Jim Thorpe. The team, which generally plays under overhand 1886 rules, was established in 2001. (More information on the team is available at www.hartfordsenators.org.)

Players’ ages vary widely. Some of the Hartford Dark Blues players are 18 or 19, although the average age is about 35, with a roster of about 20 players; typically 10 show up to a game. Positions are similar to today’s sport, although as the game evolved there were only three infielders (at the three bases) and four outfielders, one of whom was called a scout, or short scout, who tried to anticipate where the “striker” (or hitter) would hit the ball. Often he would play between third and second base, and later evolved into the position of shortstop, an important position because a “bag man,” as the infielders were called, would only be one stride away from the bag or base.

Going to a game, whether as player or spectator, is like traveling back in time. Players follow the customs of the era they’re playing in, which includes showing respect for umpires, for example, by addressing them as “Mr. Umpire, Sir.” Players also can be fined 10 cents for swears.

Fans and players alike get caught up in the whole time-travel phenomenon if the setting is just right. One tournament, for example, in Melrose, Mass., has a colonial feel to it, much like Sturbridge Village, as does another tournament the Hartford Dark Blues attended in Genesee, N.Y. Still other settings require players and spectators to look beyond the immediate environment, such as when games are played on practice football fields surrounded by modern chain-link fences.

The Hartford Dark Blues usually play a double-header when they get together, to make a day of it, says Hotchkiss. They play about 40 games a year between spring and fall, and generally travel throughout southern New England, although they’ve gone to tournaments outside Rochester, N.Y., and as far south as Maryland.

Throughout the time they’re playing, the men manage to find ways to have fun, with each player getting a nickname. Zeuschner, for example, was originally Z-Man, until during a muddy and rainy tournament, he slipped and fell and was re-christened, “Pigpen.” Hotchkiss is called “Cherokee.”

The men’s level of seriousness for replicating the authenticity of the game varies. “Some guys will go ballistic if you wear sunglasses in the field,” says Zeuschner, noting that players didn’t wear sunglasses in the 1860s or whatever early era of play is being re-enacted. “But for some guys,” he says, “it’s just sunglasses.”

And depending on the period, announcers often will not use microphones, a technology that hadn’t been invented for many of the period games. Instead, they’ll use old megaphones.

The modern version of the Hartford Dark Blues has had many homes. Indeed, for several years they split their time being the Dark Blues one game and the New Haven Elm Citys the next, switching cloth bibs on the front of their uniforms to depict either team’s name. That split-personality developed because the team was actually split between players who lived in either New Haven or Hartford, but since 2000, the team has become more Hartford-based and much more Hartford Dark Blues. (The New Haven Elm Citys only played one season back in the 1870s, posting a dismal record of 7 wins and 40 losses, one reason why they were not invited to join the National Association.)

Whatever the team name, players say the vintage game attracts a great group of guys. “You meet all kinds of people playing the game,” says Zeuschner, who has channeled his love of baseball into a new realm as director of umpires of West Hartford Little League. One of his goals – to play on the Dark Blues with his son, Paul, who just turned 11 — probably will not be realized given the double bind: Players must be at least 16 and Zeuschner’s inability to play due to his injury. Still like baseball itself, hope springs eternal.

“Maybe I could get a pinch-hitting appearance,” says the Z-Man, thinking about what could happen five years into the future with his boy. “I know he’d love to play.”

To find out more information about the Hartford Dark Blues or vintage base ball, go to the team’s website at www.hartforddarkblues.org.

Leonard Felson is a freelance writer and frequent contributor to Seasons.