Hello and welcome to Issue 006 of Shoeless Notes, the email newsletter for the Shoeless Joe Jackson Museum and Baseball Library in Greenville, South Carolina.
Since it’s the end of October, I feel like this the perfect time to tell you about one of my favorite late-October traditions. Something we’ve been doing every year for over a decade, and is the reason I’m even writing this email to you right now, to be honest. That tradition is playing in an 1860s style vintage Base Ball game as part of the team representing the Shoeless Joe Jackson Museum. Since 2009, our team has played that game against a team representing the Ty Cobb Museum from Royston, Georgia.
The Vintage Games logo, by Ryan Tinnerman
My involvement in this event started completely by happenstance. My parents had just retired and moved from Chicago to South Carolina, so I went to go visit them to see their new house. The Shoeless Joe Jackson Museum and Baseball Library had recently opened, and, as a family of White Sox fans and baseball history buffs, we all wanted to check it out. At that time, the museum was run by Arlene Marcley and her husband, Bill.
My parents and I were walking around the museum, recognizing photos we’d seen hundreds of times over the years, and pointing out to each other the ones we’d never seen before. I was 22 at the time, and Arlene came up to me and said “You look like you play baseball!” I hadn’t played competitively in a few years, which I told her, but confirmed that I used to. “Well, we have a game on Saturday, and it starts at 11 am, so you should get there around 10,” she insisted. Once I realized I was being invited to play in the game, and not just being invited to watch, we delayed my flight back to Chicago a day so I could be at the game on Saturday, and at the team practice the night before.
It was a decision that would change the course of my life. The practice we had that Friday night was a lot of fun, mainly because it was re-learning a game we were so familiar with, but with “new” rules. We were playing 1860s style rules, so the ball we used was a little bigger and a little softer than a modern baseball. We weren’t allowed to wear gloves or cleats, since those weren’t around in the 1860s yet. To make up for the fact that the fielders didn’t wear gloves, one of the rules was that if a fielder caught a batted ball on one bounce, the batter was out. Runners, however, were free to advance at their own risk once a ball hit the ground, whether the ball was caught after bouncing or not. That made for some rather adventurous baserunning at first, but once everybody got the hang of it, deciding how and when to run, and how and when to catch certain balls became a strategy unto itself. To read up on all of the rules differences, you can check out THIS PAGE on our website.
A vintage Base Ball awaits its destiny upon the Brandon Mill ball field. Photo courtesy of Matt Rumpfeldt.
After practice, our team went out to dinner at a local restaurant and got to know each other. It became apparent that there were people from all over the country who came in to be a part of this event. Joe Jackson historians and experts, fans of baseball in general, fans of Joe specifically, and even some members of the Jackson family tree. One of those members, Allison, played in the game with us. Being around such an amazing group of people who all had this shared interest really was something special. The game the next day was just going to be icing on the cake.
Saturday came, and the Ty Cobb team drove up to Greenville to play us on the ball field behind Brandon Mill. Ty Cobb’s granddaughter threw out the first pitch of the game (to Allison Jackson, who caught it at home plate), and before the game had even began, everyone had goosebumps. When I played baseball competitively, I usually played 3rd Base or Center Field, but I requested to play Left Field for this event because that’s where Joe played. I even played one inning out there without my shoes on, though I think my mom and I might have been the only two to notice that while it was happening. I secured the last out of the game by making a long, running, over-the-shoulder catch on a deep fly ball that would have at least tied the game had I not caught it. I held the ball over my head to let everyone know I had it, and the crowd, dare I say, went wild.
Needless to say, I was hooked. The entire event was such a thrill, and every year after that, I planned my trip to come visit my parents around when the vintage games were going to be. One year, we would host the games in Greenville and the Ty Cobb team would come up to play. The next year, the Ty Cobb Museum would host the games in Royston, and we would all drive down to Georgia to play there. The games were always on a Saturday, but every year we would have our team practice the night before, and then go out to dinner together. Those Friday night practices became just as special as the games. And the group of people who play has become like a second family.
My own family became more and more involved with the museum over the years, and I am one of the few people to have played in the vintage games every single year since they began in 2009. When Arlene retired last year, the museum’s Board of Directors called me to ask if I wanted to come take over. They had known me for over a decade, and knew my dedication and enthusiasm for Joe, and for baseball history. I said yes, and moved from Chicago to become the museum’s new Executive Director. None of this would have happened had it not been for the vintage games.
Unfortunately, with coronavirus making travel a concern, our two museums decided it was best for us to not have the event this year. The games were scheduled to be in Royston, and with Georgia being such a hot spot, we didn’t feel comfortable possibly exposing any of our players, their families, or any fans who come out to watch the games. But this event has become the highlight of the year for many of our participants, so our team decided that even though we wouldn’t be playing the actual game, we still wanted to get together and have our annual practice. It’s the one time a year we all get to see each other, and for most of us, it’s also the one time a year we pick up a bat or throw a ball. It’s much easier to knock off one year worth of rust than two, so this past Saturday, our team got together and had a little scrimmage among ourselves.
The 2020 Shoeless Joes (Top row, left to right: Wade Hanley, Joseph Tedrick, Wesley Fricks, Mike Tedrick, Frank Gonzalez, Parker Utter, Mike Miller, Ben Shorb, Steve Dilger, Joshua Allen / Bottom row, left to right: Matt Rumpfeldt, Allison Jackson, Dan Wallach, Sabina Mujic)
I mentioned earlier that the field we play on is right behind Brandon Mill in Greenville. That field has some major significance to Joe’s life, and is yet another reason why playing in these games is so special. The field is known today as Shoeless Joe Jackson Memorial Park. Richard Heusel donated the land to the City of Greenville, and signs were constructed at the entrance to the park telling people about the history that took place there.
The original sign at the entrance of Shoeless Joe Jackson Memorial Park in Greenville.
Way back when, that piece of land is where the Brandon Mill baseball team played their games. For those of you who know your Joe Jackson and/or Textile League history, you’ll know that the first real baseball team Joe ever played for was the Brandon Mill team. Joe’s dad worked at Brandon Mill, and Joe started working there at the age of 6 sweeping floors and doing other little tasks. Joe started playing for Brandon in 1901, when he was just 13 years old. By the time he was 15, he was one of the best players in the league, and was starting to gain attention across Greenville and in South Carolina as an up-and-coming superstar.
Old aerial photo of Brandon Mill, the mill community, and the Brandon Mill ball field.
Back when Joe played on this field, however, its orientation was flipped. This old aerial photo of the mill village shows the original orientation of the ball field. As you can see, the mill is in foul territory, deep down the third base line. Way past the center field fence are some trees. Between those trees and the center field fence, there used to be a smokestack from the incinerator where the old dump was. Joe was famous for hitting balls into that dump back when he played for Brandon, and is one of the only players to ever hit a ball into the trees.
Today, home plate is located where center field used to be, so the mill is still in foul territory, but nowadays it’s deep down the first base line. Each year when we take our team photo, we try to remember to take it so Brandon Mill is in the background. To check out photos from each of the previous Vintage Games, check out THIS PAGE on our website, which we recently updated.
Shoeless Joe Jackson Memorial Park in 2020. Note the water tower and the mill in foul territory down the 1st base line now.
Each newsletter, we’re going to spotlight one new member as a token of our appreciation. This issue, we’d like to tell you a little bit about Jeremy Darnell, who recently became a member.
New member Jeremy Darnell stands next to the retired number of his favorite player, Don Mattingly. Jeremy attended graduate school in New York and was a short ride on the 4 train away from the Yankee Stadium bleachers.
Jeremy was born and raised in Travelers Rest, South Carolina and currently lives in Greenville. His whole family is still in the area, and their roots here run deep. He attended the same elementary school as his great grandmother. Jeremy has lived most of his life in the Upstate, except for a couple years in Charleston, and after graduating from Furman. He is the Operations Manager at InStream Environmental.
Jeremy has been a baseball fan his entire life, and some of his earliest memories are playing with his dad when he was little. He also became interested in Shoeless Joe at a young age. His grandfather was born and raised in the Brandon Mill community and grew up on Dorsey Avenue. He told Jeremy about Joe, and how he would talk to him whenever he would see him around town, particularly at his liquor store. His grandfather and other neighborhood kids would gather in front of the store on Pendleton Street and listen to Joe talk about his time in the big leagues. Seeing Eight Men Out and Field of Dreams as a kid made Jeremy realize just how famous, or infamous, Shoeless Joe was with people outside of Greenville.
Jeremy became a Yankees fan at an early age. Growing up, the Darnell family had one of those gigantic satellite dishes in their backyard so they could watch the Yankees on WPIX and MSG. Don Mattingly is still Jeremy’s favorite player of all time, but he loved to watch Rickey Henderson torture opposing teams on the basepaths, and marveled at Dave Winfield’s long arms and slight hunch in the batter’s box. If he could have one piece of baseball memorabilia from history, it would be the ball Charlie Hayes caught for the last out of the 1996 World Series. Jeremy was born a few weeks after the 1978 World Series, so ’96 was the first time he ever saw his team win it all, a moment that “felt like the payoff for watching some horrendous New York teams in the late 1980s and early 1990s.”
Knowing he’s a lifelong Yankees fan, it should come as no surprise that his “time machine moment” would be July 4, 1939 at Yankee Stadium. That was Lou Gehrig Appreciation Day and it's the day he delivered baseball's most famous speech, during which he famously said "Today I consider myself the luckiest man on the face of earth." The Yankees played a doubleheader that day, and though the baseball would be secondary to the speech, going to that moment would also enable Jeremy to see Joe DiMaggio at his peak.
Jeremy heard that Joe Jackson’s house was being moved in 2006 and that a museum was being planned from local media, and he has followed the museum throughout its existence. He has been many times, and loves the museum. In fact, Jeremy has even played in our Vintage Games before. But it’s not just Jeremy who is a part of our Vintage Games history. Jeremy’s dad, Rex, has acted as our “Judge” (which is what they used to call the umpire) many times. Rex always dresses to the nines and has become as integral a part of the experience as the game itself.
Me, Rex Darnell, and Allison Jackson at the 2011 Vintage Games in Greenville. Shoeless Joe follows through to the right of Allison.
If you want to have a chance to be the new member we spotlight in our next newsletter, you can BECOME A MEMBER of our museum at whichever level best fits your current budget.
As always, thanks for being here. Until next time…
-dan
Loved this issue! We were bummed that we missed out on the games this year but we will looking forward to being there next time!
Dan, this is by far my favorite issue. What an incredibly touching story about the making of the Vintage Games! The background history and the photos you shared are all wonderful. I would love to make a trip to either ballfield to watch your practice and game. I apologize for making this so short, but I’m dealing with a broken wrist and fractured right arm. Of course I’m right handed, so it makes it extremely difficult for me to text. I just had to let you know what a wonderful job you did on this issue!