Birmingham Barons Then and Now

The Birmingham Barons have been a professional baseball presence in the city since 1885, with only three brief gaps of years they did not play. Since 1910 three stadiums have been home to the team: Rickwood Field, Hoover Metropolitan Stadium and the current Regions Field downtown near Railroad Park. Numerous Major League and Negro League stars played on those fields, especially Rickwood, the first concrete and steel stadium in the minor leagues. Today the Barons are a Double-A affiliate of the Chicago White Sox. 

On Tuesday night, August 20, son Amos and I attended a game and watched the Barons defeat the Biloxi Shuckers in a comeback win 6-5. Some photos are below. This experience brought to mind some items of Barons' memorabilia that have been in the family since the mid-1990s. More on that and other goodies are also below.

I've previously written a blog piece on the Barons discussing a 1917 photo of the team. 

You can find almost 600 digitized items related to the Barons' history at the Alabama Mosaic site. 

Further Reading

Allen Barra, Rickwood Field: A Century in America's Oldest Ballpark. 2010

William J. Plott, Black Baseball's Last Team Standing: The Birmingham Black Barons, 1919-1962. 2019

Watkins, Clarence. Baseball in Birmingham. 2010

This board with its removable discs appeared in 1995 or 1996 during a craze for "pogs", a modern version of the milk cap games that dated from before World War II.

These Barons players appear on the "pog" board. I have included the states where they were born and the years they played in Birmingham. Since two of the players appeared on a Barons roster only in 1995, I'm assuming that's the year of this item. Several of these players had some time in the majors as well as other minor league teams. Search for them at the Baseball Reference site for more details. 

Jimmy Hurst [Alabama, 1995-6]
Mike Cameron [Georgia, 1995-1996]
Jeff Abbott [Georgia, 1995]
Eddie Pearson [Alabama, 1995-7]
Greg Norton [California, 1995-1996]
Troy Fryman [Florida, 1994-6]
Glenn Disarcina [Massachusetts, 1993-6]
Scott Vollmer (California, 1995-6]
Scott Christman [Arizona, 1995]

Two of these players are Alabama natives. Jimmy Hurst was born in Tuscaloosa in 1972 and was a star high school player. He had a long career on various minor league teams and played briefly for the Detroit Tigers in 1997. Unfortunately, Hurst died of a brain bleed on July 6, 2024, age 52. You can see some of his baseball cards here.

Eddie Pearson, born in Mobile in 1974, also had an extensive minor league career. He played at Bishop State Community College in Mobile. You can see his Barons baseball card here.

This board was sponsored by radio station Magic96.FM and Galleria Fun Country, which was located near the Riverchase Galleria. We spent some time there with the kids in the mid-1990s. The place appealed to children in a way similar to Chucky Cheese and was a good venue for birthday parties. Originally known as Riverchase Golf and Games, the place apparently created fond memories in others, too. Earlier this year someone on Redditt was asking for photos and the responses were interesting. 

As the game progressed and darkness fell, the moon rose over Children's Hospital. 

A view of the field early in the game

Along the stadium concourse are large photographs of baseball stars who played for the Barons, including Reggie Jackson in 1967. 

Piper Davis, Birmingham Black Barons, 1942-1948

Frank Thomas, 1990

Michael Jordan, 1994

A photo taken before the game started 

Naturally before the game we made a stop at the Good People Brewing Company just across the street from Regions Field.

A few ticket stubs from games we attended back in the day....

Birmingham Photo of the Day (56): The Barons in 1917

The 1917 season was the seventh that the Barons played at Rickwood Field. This period was the "dead ball era" in professional baseball in which strategy, base hits and speed at stealing bases were most important. Home runs were not emphasized by players or fans, and teams hit very few. 

At this time the Barons played in the Southern Association League. By 1917 the Barons had won four league titles in 1888, 1906, 1912 and 1914. For those last two championships the team was managed by Carlton Molesworth. He came to the Barons as an outfielder in 1906 and managed the team from 1908 until 1922.

The Barons did not win a championship in 1917; they finished third with a record of 87-66. They did draw the fans, though; over 9000 attended on opening day and more than 115,000 over the season.

Four no-hitters were pitched at Rickwood that season. Barons pitchers Ralph Comstock, Carmen Hill and Ray Milligan had one each. A pitcher for the Little Rock Travelers also threw a no-hitter at the park. Hill's final record of 26-12 set a Barons record for wins in a season. Further information on Comstock and Hill is below; Milligan apparently did not play in the major leagues. 

The Birmingham Black Barons shared Rickwood Field with the white team, but did not begin play until 1920. 

Allen Barra's history of the stadium is Rickwood Field: A Century in America's Oldest Ballpark published in 2010.

Birmingham Barons, Rickwood Field, spring 1917. Taken by O.V. Hunt. I wonder what position the dog played. See Comstock's photo below; is that him holding the dog? Not sure which one might be Hill.


  Source: Birmingham Public Library 

Right-handed pitcher Comstock was born November 24, 1890, in Sylvania, Ohio. He played three non-consecutive seasons in the major leagues, finishing with an 11-14 record as a pitcher. 

Source: Baseball Reference

Right hander Carmen Hill was born October 1, 1895, in Royalton, Minnesota. He pitched 10 years for several teams in the National League with a final record of 49-33. His last season was 1930.

Source: Baseball Reference

Who Tossed My Baseball Cards?

I recently had lunch at Taste of Thailand [very good food] in Hoover, and noticed the empty shop seen below in the same commercial strip. I have no idea how long the store operated, but there was a comment posted on Yelp in December 2007. I realized this ghost sign offered a chance to drag out some old Birmingham Barons baseball cards I salvaged when my son was about to toss them. I can also wax nostalgic about baseball cards in general. 

The cards have been around for a long time. According to Wikipedia, trade cards featuring baseball players began to appear in the late 1860's in the U.S. Modern card history began in the late 1940's. Markets for the cards have ebbed and flowed over the years depending on economic factors, world wars, and such baseball-related events as the 1994 players strike. Cards have been marketed mainly to adults, children or collectors or more than one of these groups at various times. Baseball cards appeared in other countries as early as the late 1890's when they became available in Japan. Cuba followed in 1909 and Canada in 1912. 

The Birmingham Barons have a long history beginning in 1885 that you can read about here and here. At times the team has left the city as owners change; the current team arrived in 1981 under the aegis of the Detroit Tigers. The team moved from classic Rickwood Field to the larger Hoover Met beginning with the 1988 season. In 2013 the Barons moved back downtown to Regions Field next to Railroad Park. 

Thus the 1989 Barons' cards below are from the team's second year at the Met. The final card is from the 1991 season, also at the Met. The Barons won the West Division of the Southern League in both of those seasons. The back of each of these cards gives personal information about the players as well as their professional baseball achievements. I wonder how many of them are still associated with baseball in some way?

Baseball cards have survived a long time. Apparently the market for vintage paper cards is robust. Now you can even buy digital cards, but they wouldn't be the same. I can't imagine how you would attach them with clothes pins to your bicycle spokes and ride around making that cool noise like my friends and I used to do back in the day. 

Now for the big question--who tossed MY baseball cards?? Well, probably mom, as the cliche goes, but it doesn't really matter now. I didn't have any Honus Wagner or Ty Cobb or Babe Ruth cards anyway.....might have had Roger Maris and Mickey Mantle, though!!