Baseball is once again 'A Gentleman's Game'

By KURT NESBITT

Journal Staff Writer

FORT RIDGELY -- You'd think that in 90-degree heat, cotton baseball uniforms and wool Army uniforms like the ones worn in the 1860's would be too hot to play in on a sunny, balmy Saturday afternoon.

But you'd be wrong if you saw what some saw near Fairfax Saturday.

Decked out in red caps and heavy red pants, white belts and white shirts with red Q's stitched on them, The Quicksteps, a group of historical baseball buffs from the Twin Cities, joined Civil War reenactors for two games of old-style baseball at Fort Ridgely Saturday afternoon.

The Quicksteps were in town to play against both the Fort Ridgely Defenders, a team made up of local guys dressed to period, reenactors portraying the First Minnesota Infantry, who were still stationed at the fort in the early 1860s, and the New Ulm Battery, which was formed after the Dakota Conflict of 1862 and still drills with its original Civil War era ordnance.

"A few of us played (baseball) in high school," said Quicksteps general manager and founder Bob "Slow Trot" Thalkes. "But most of us are just history nuts."

Thalkes said the team was started around 1994. It is made of men and boys from around the Twin Cities metropolitan area and is one of three vintage baseball groups in Minnesota. Others are found in Rochester, Hastings and Stillwater and play against The Quicksteps at various historical festivals around the state.

It was quite possibly the way baseball was originally intended, played by the 33 original rules drawn up by a guy named Alexander Cartwright of the New York Knickerbockers in 1845.

The teams played on a field similar to one used around that era. It was one played with an all-grass field, no gloves, no sliding and no foul language. All the players on the field were required to tuck their shirts in, as it was ungentlemanly to leave them hanging out with so many women and children watching.

There was even a warning -- for unsportsman-like conduct for sliding into a base -- given by an umpire who roamed the infield in a long, black three-piece suit issuing phrases like "One hand dead" after the first out was made and "strker to the line, please" once a team began its turn at the plate. Stealing bases was allowed back then, but sliding and arguing with a call in an ungentlemanly manner were considered unsportsmanlike. Players could even seen fines of up to 25 cents for a violation -- a whole week's pay in 1862.

"We expect sportsmanlike conduct in this game, gentlemen," reminded umpire Gregg Richardson as he strolled along the Defenders' bench.

The match, as several called it, began at 4 p.m. with an introduction of both team's lineups. The Fort Ridgely Singers sang "Hail Columbia", the unofficial national anthem of the time. An actor portraying then-presidential candidate Abraham Lincoln threw out the first pitch after another actor protraying Minnesota's pioneering Bishop Whipple gave a convocation to the throng, as crowds were called back then.

The game between The Quicksteps and the Defenders lasted for about two hours, when the First Minnesota Infantry took the field dressed in the dark blue wool uniforms worn by the Union Army in the early days of the Civil War. In both matches, players used wooden bats and soft, homemade leather balls.

Whenever a team scores an "ace" (a run), the player that crossed the round home plate is required to report the score to a tallykeeper, who sits along the first base line behind a table, and ring a bell to let the throng know an ace has been scored.

The game's lone umpire, who wanders around the field and periodically updates the throng on what's going on in the game, judges each ball "fair" or "foul" while it's still in the air. An infielder can still get an out if he catches the ball after its first bounce, regardless of whether it goes fair or foul.

Defenders coach and organizer Randy Krzmarzick, of Sleepy Eye, said the baseball game fits with the period because many soldiers at Fort Ridgely and Fort Snelling were men from the East Coast, where baseball was wildly popular. Tholkes said the baseball began to spread all over the county after the Civil War ended because of soliders who brought the game home.

Jim "The Count" Wyman, a Quickstepper from Anoka, said he's been into baseball since his childhood in Massachusetts and New Hampshire. He said there are several major differences between modern-day baseball and the 1860's version he helped recreate Saturday afternoon.

First, Wyman said, the pitcher's role is simply to help the striker hit the ball; it isn't to strike him out like in today's game. Second, the umpire calls balls fair or foul depending only on where they first land, not on where they go afterward. The umpire is also less active in the 1860's version, Wyman said.

"They expect us to be honest rather than partisan on a questionable play," he explained as the First Minnesota Infantry took the field to warm up. "There was no rough play allowed and you couldn't overrun first base."

When asked which version of the game her preferred, Wyman said he likes both.

"It's changed becasue it's improved," Wyman explained. "Each development was a reaction and a solution to a problem."

For example, umpires began calling pitches "ball" or "strike" because hitting "took forever," Wyman said.

"What we have now as baseball developed from this," he continued. "The developments in the next 30 years basically brought us modern baseball. 1893 was the start of the modern era. There wasn't a significant change again until the designated hitter came in 1973."