Glastonbury Vintage Base Ball Weekend (June 11 and 12 2005)

GLASTONBURY - Vintage baseball makes its Glastonbury debut on June 11 & 12 with a special four-game weekend event scheduled at Welles Street Riverfront Park that will include five clubs playing the game by 19^th century rules, uniforms, equipment, customs and etiquette.

The Free Admission event is sponsored by Glastonbury’s Diamond Pub & Grille, Giovanni’s Brick Oven Pizzeria, Hebron Ave Shell, Flowers by the Way, Hartford-based Vintage Base Ball Factory with endorsing sponsor by the Glastonbury Little League and assistance by Glastonbury Park & Rec. Game times are scheduled for Noon and 3pm each day with two eras of play to be featured including 1876 and 1886 baseball.

Vintage baseball is a new and growing national sport that involves amateur clubs playing the game by 19^th century rules and is a unique blend of baseball living history, theatre and competitive gentlemanly play. Currently, nearly 200 clubs representing 28 states play vintage baseball.

Clubs scheduled to appear from Connecticut include the Hartford Senators, Simsbury Taverneers and Newtown Sandy Hooks along with the Pittsfield Elms and Mudville Nine (Boston) from Massachusetts. Two of the country’s top vintage clubs Hartford and Pittsfield, featured last Fourth of July in the ESPN Classic nationally broadcast vintage game, will open the event on Saturday in a game billed as The Great Rematch.

“Vintage baseball offers spectators an opportunity to witness how the game was played and evolved more than 125 years ago,” said event planner Greg Martin, president of Vintage Base Ball Factory in Hartford. “It is a wonderful sporting and historical event to be enjoyed by all ages, especially children.”

Some rules and equipment differences include players wearing gloves not larger than a gardener’s glove, no helmets or batting gloves, foul balls are not strikes, pitchers throw from a 4’x6’ “box” -- no mound -- at a 50’ distance, seven balls for a walk, no balk rule, batters request high or low strike zone prior to batting, foul balls caught on a bounce are an out.

Glastonbury Vintage Game Schedule:

JUNE 11:

NOON (1886 Rules):

Hartford Senators vs. Pittsfield Elms

3PM (1876 Rules):

Mudville Nine vs. Newtown Sandy Hooks

JUNE 12:

NOON (1886 Rules):

Hartford Senators vs. Simsbury Taverneers

3PM (1876 Rules):

All-Star Game