Written By John Caverhill
“In the Spring a young man’s fancy lightly turns to thoughts of love.” In the case of an old man (me) memories of activities on the ball diamond often come to mind.
In summer evenings in the early 1940s I would look across our pasture field to where a group of young teenagers, including my older brother Ron, were playing ‘pick-up ball’ on the rough but serviceable diamond next to the town line. Complete with backstop, it was there long enough to have paths worn between the bases. It fell into disuse by 1945 with more finished diamonds in local villages taking over.
When I started school, our total sports equipment consisted of one softball and one heavy bat. The softball was the only one of its type I have ever seen. My brother Ron, who graduated the year before I started, said the ball was already in use when he started school. A survivor of an earlier age, it was called an outseam softball; the seams were turned out rather than in when stitched, leaving a ridged surface. Many years of use in all kinds of weather left the ball the colour and consistency of weathered wood and when you caught it, the ridges left red marks on your hands. (This was still the era when catcher and first base were the only positions where a glove was allowed in softball.)
When I was in grade two a new teacher, Miss Chute, took over and she remained until my class graduated in 1949. A good ball player, one of the first things she did was get us a new ball and another, more kid-friendly bat.
She was also responsible for our family’s first visit to Labatt Park in London. The London Supremes were, at that time, a perennial top contender in the ladies’ fastball league that consisted of teams from across southwestern Ontario. Miss Chute’s sister was the heavy-hitting catcher for the Aylmer team and we went to see Aylmer play London. I had two favourite players, one of course was my teacher’s sister and the other was Marion Knowles, star pitcher for the Supremes. It was an exciting game with London winning by one run. Miss Chute’s sister had two hits and was intentionally walked her last time up, so I went home happy because my two favourites both did well.
I played first base for many years, graduating to hardball in the early 1950s. Jim McNair, only a teenager himself, organized a junior team for Ilderton. There was no local junior league so Jim arranged games wherever he could find them. I remember playing teams from Poplar Hill, Strathroy, and St. Thomas. The St. Thomas game was played on a Sunday afternoon. At that time organized Sunday sports, especially at the local level, were very much frowned upon. My dad didn’t say anything but I could feel his disapproval and I think other parents felt the same way because we never played another Sunday game.
The local senior league consisted of teams from Poplar Hill, Ilderton, Devizes, Crumlin, and Evelyn. At that time Ilderton Fairgrounds had a dirt track for sulky racing behind the old arena and the continuation school, and the ball diamond was inside the track. The games had to be played before sundown as none of the fields had lights. For the same reason, the season concluded by early August as the sun set earlier in the evening.
In the early 1950s, several of us graduated to the senior team as many of the older players retired. Don Urbshott, Stu and Max O’Neil, Bill Thurlwall, Keith Scarborough, George Kennedy, Scott McNair, Roy Bloomfield, and Doug McAndlass are some of the players I recall. With the exception of Don, Scott and Roy, we were seventeen or eighteen years old. I still remember the thrill the first time I donned the Ilderton uniform, grey with red trim.
The biggest game of the year for us was at Poplar Hill picnic. Poplar Hill and Ilderton were always the featured teams and because many of the opposing players knew each other well, there was quite a rivalry. Of all the local diamonds, Poplar Hill was by far the best with a smooth sand infield and a level, mowed outfield. When fielding a hard ground ball, it was nice to know the ball was going to end up in your glove rather than smacking you in the jaw. There was always a large crowd for this afternoon game.
Our young team played only two years of hardball and then the league folded and we switched to fastball, which is another story.
