Summer 25 OP Newsletter

HERITAGE SITES

In 1871, the first professional league, the National Association of Professional Base Ball Players, was founded; five years later, the National League replaced the National Association on February 2, 1876. In 1901, the American League (the other league in modern Major League Baseball) was created. Up until the 1880s, baseball used to be two words and was spelled “base ball” or “base-ball.” However, in the 1880s, many newspapers began to combine these two words into one. The Chicago Tribune adopted this spelling in 1891.

Orland Reds, 1910

The earliest known mention of a baseball team in Orland is from a

newspaper article in The Inter Ocean on June 17, 1895. The writer reported the results from a recent baseball game between the Orland Blues and the Palos Stars. The earliest known mention of an organized baseball club in Orland comes from the same newspaper on May 26, 1900, in which the Orland Baseball Club was looking for a Chicago baseball club to play against for a Decoration Day (Memorial Day) game. The early 1900s is when many of Orland’s baseball teams began to form, including the Orland Grays, Orland Reds, Orland Blues, Wagoners, Orland Juniors, Orland Boosters and the Wabash teams. These teams were composed of members of the community, and they played against other groups from local towns, such as the Jarvis team from Joliet, the Bremen Bull Frogs, the Palos Stars and the Oak Forest Acorns. Many baseball teams, including rural ones, took their names from the color of their uniform stockings (ex. Orland Grays, Reds and Blues); this practice gave them a quick and memorable form of identification. Today, two major league baseball teams are named for the color of their stockings: the Chicago White Sox and the Boston Red Sox. From the 1920s through the 1950s, organizations both civic and commercial sponsored local baseball teams and searched for strong players to recruit. In exchange, the organization “paid” the player with a place to stay in the town and/or a job. Sponsored baseball teams helped boost morale and community pride. The Orland Wabash teams, for example, were sponsored by the Wabash Railroad. Though Orland Park’s baseball teams mostly played in local, recreational games, there are a few examples where they participated in games against semi-professional teams. In 1927, Orland was scheduled to play against Blue Island’s baseball team in the Midwest League, a semi-professional baseball circuit composed of Chicagoland teams from the 1920s to the 1940s. On July 21, 1929, the Orland team played a game against the Ernie Withall Semi-Pro Baseball Club at St. Rita Field (64th Street and Claremont Avenue in Chicago, Illinois).

orlandpark.org | Summer 2025 |

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