FREMONT – See how baseball was played during the Civil War era, when it was first rising to popularity, with the Spiegel Grove Squires.
The Squires, the vintage team at the Hayes Presidential Library & Museums, have three home games and will participate in vintage base ball tournaments and games at other sites in Ohio.
Home games are played on the lawn behind the Hayes Home, and admission is free.
The Squires bring to life the sport when it became organized with standard rules of play for clubs. Back then, base ball was spelled with two words.
The Squires are volunteers who have studied and learned the methods of play used in the 1860s, including playing bare-handed. Players are called ballists, and they wear period-style uniforms and adopt the language of 19th-century base ball during their matches, as games were called during the 1860s.
The Squires are sponsored by Whirlpool Corp.
The 2023 schedule is:
Sunday – 2 p.m. vs. the Ohio Village Muffins at Ohio Village in Columbus.
Saturday, June 10 – 1 p.m. vs. Pluggy’s Town BBC at home.
Sunday, June 25 – 1 p.m. vs. celebrity all-stars at home.
Saturday, July 1 – Time TBA at the Spencer Bicentennial Festival in Spencer.
Sunday, July 9 – 1:30 p.m. vs. the Clodbusters BBC and Champion City Reapers in Dayton.
Sunday, July 16 – 1 p.m. vs. the Great Black Swamp Frogs at home.
Sunday, Aug. 20 – 11 a.m. at the Canal Cup, hosted by the Canal Dover Redlegs, in Dover.
Saturday, Sept. 2, and Sunday, Sept. 3 – Times TBA at the Ohio Cup, presented by the Ohio Village Muffins, at Ohio Village in Columbus.
Sunday, Sept. 16 – Time TBA at the Tiffin Heritage Festival at Hedges Boyer Park in Tiffin.
The Hayes Presidential Library & Museums is America’s first presidential library and the forerunner for the federal presidential library system. It is partially funded by the state of Ohio and affiliated with the Ohio History Connection. The Hayes Presidential Library & Museums is located at Spiegel Grove at the corner of Hayes and Buckland avenues.
For information, call 419-332-2081, or visit rbhayes.org.
