I do not know when the first baseball game was played in Tyrone but by 1890 it was being played on a sandlot basis by children and men alike. Once in a while a good group would put a challenge in The Tyrone Herald to take on others; if the challenge was accepted, the results of the game would appear later in the paper.
In the spring of 1891 the Conrad Opera House burned down. This was the primary source of entertainment in the town with its never-ending run of plays, burlesque acts, circuses, magicians, singers, and orchestras. The town suddenly found itself with nothing to do and baseball offered relief for the problem. Suddenly every “nine” that could be fielded was issuing challenges to anyone who could swing a bat. Railroad yard workers challenged teams of barbers, merchants, or anyone they could find. These were rude affairs and crazy scores like 34-4 or 25-27 were the norm. As the summer progressed, the better teams extended their challenges to neighboring cities. Altoona, Bellefonte, and Philipsburg were each invited in to have a game. There were no uniforms or team names, and I’m guessing that equipment and field conditions varied widely from game to game. But that didn’t matter — Tyrone had fallen in love with baseball.
With the opening of the new Nau’s Opera House in late 1891, the baseball mania could have faded, but it didn’t.
The Tyrone Fatty’s
In 1892, the town saw the creation of one of the strangest baseball teams ever — The Tyrone Fatty’s. The Fatty’s sole claim to fame was that the starting nine weighed in at one ton. The Fatty’s took on all comers and late in the season went to Houtzdale for a game. Houtzdale had also put together a Fatty’s team. The Tyrone Herald noted that a picture of the teams had been taken and “it was a big picture.”
1892 saw the formation of a league of towns with baseball teams, and late in the season a planned schedule of games was followed. Box scores for the games started to appear in the newspaper.
1893: Tyrone Joins Two Leagues
In 1893, Tyrone baseball stepped up to a new level. Tyrone joined not one but two new baseball leagues. The Center League scheduled games with teams from Bellefonte, Port Matilda, Osceola Mills, Philipsburg, Houtzdale, and Clearfield. The Juniata Valley League included teams from Renovo, Bloomsburg, Williamsport, and Milton. Tyrone eventually played for the first championship of that league.
By June it was clear that Tyrone needed a more formal setup and a Baseball Association was chartered. Benefits were held to buy uniforms and to improve the ballpark. At one of their first games, a gate of $30 was collected, which is pretty substantial in a time when a ticket was probably five cents. Bellefonte became Tyrone’s arch rival and for one game at Bellefonte in July, a special train was arranged to take the team and over 100 fans to the game and back. Tyrone won handily in a game “played to perfection” according to the Herald. The Bellefonte paper didn’t see it that way and called the Tyrone team a bunch of “larcenous scoundrels and cheats.”
On June 19, 1893, twenty-five-year-old Max Meindel became the first person in Blair County to be killed by a baseball, when he took a pitch to the head and suffered a fractured skull. He was playing for an Altoona club called Defiance. He had played with Tyrone the previous two years.
It appears from reading the old newspapers that these baseball clubs were paying players. Players cut from Altoona and Osceola Mills teams were noted in the papers as quickly being recruited to join the Tyrone team. At a time when a railroad laborer was making 9 cents an hour, even making a dollar or two a ball game was substantial. 1893 also saw the first regular baseball column in The Tyrone Herald, which gave the players’ batting averages.
In closing, it should be noted that fair umpires were held in high regard. One man running for political office noted as one of his credentials that he was “highly esteemed as a baseball umpire and noted for his fairness.”
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