San Diego Sports History: Baseball

Baseball | Football | Stadiums | Hunting | Horses | Golf | Watersports | Tennis | Other Sports

Herbert C. Hensley’s Memoirs at the San Diego History Center provide some insight to the look and feel of the local game during the late 1800s. “The catcher’s mask was only just coming in,” Hensley wrote, ” . . at least hereabouts. Aside from that, and a glove (not a mitt), for his left hand, the catcher had no protection. The umpire had none whatsoever, nor did the other players. I well remember when Bert Edwards exhibited the first glove ever brought to San Diego, some years later, and how it was at first ridiculed as a sissy affair. The catcher, customarily, was content to take pitched balls on the first bounce, even with runners on base or with two strikes called.”

• San Diego and Coronado Baseball teams, perhaps 1873, on baseball lot bounded by 6th, 7th, C and D Streets [cropped]
• Pickwick’s baseball team, 1887
• Schiller & Murtha baseball team, 1887
• Poway’s I.O.G.T. baseball team (sitting) and Ramona’s first team, 1897 [cropped]
• World Series scoreboard, outside Beeman & Brady’s, October 5, 1912 [cropped]
• National City High School Baseball Team, June 17, 1913 Won 6, Lost 0 – Players
• Logan Heights School baseball team / Spaulding Trophy
• U.S.S. Alert baseball team, circa 1918
• Aerial view of Lane Field (before construction) and San Diego Bay, 1936
• Lane Field construction, March 31, 1936
• Aerial view of Lane Field and San Diego Bay, 1936
• San Diego Padres baseball team, 1936 – detail
• San Diego Padres teammates, March 24, 1948
• Luke Easter, San Diego Padre, March 29, 1949
• Whitey Wietelmann at Lane Field, 1950 (later Padres coach)
• Steve Bilko batting at Lane Field, August 19, 1956; Astroth catching, Kerr umpire
• Lane Field ticket office, April 11, 1957 [UT84:34208.13]
• Rudy Regalado crosses home plate vs. LA, June 15, 1957

 

San Diego’s best: Breitbard Hall of Famers from the San Diego Hall of Champions.

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Order prints of these and many other images from the Photo Archives of the San Diego History Center. These photographs have excellent detail which cannot be fully appreciated on the computer screen.