Page 10 - The Wayne Dispatch
P. 10
The Wayne Stars
The History of Wayne’s Town Baseball Team
By Tyler Moll of the Rite Aid on Michigan Avenue
The game of baseball was in- E. In the 1890s the team consisted
vented in New York in 1839, and of Stellwagen, Cozadd, Hawley, Zim-
quickly became Americas favorite merman, Francisco, Curtis and Kirk-
sport. The earliest account of base- wood with some alternates. These
ball in Wayne comes from a dairy men were not young kids either,
entry by Albert Coleburn, dated Au- most owned businesses in town and
gust 10, 1866. Mr. Coleburn men- were store owners, butchers,
tions that the Detroit Ball Club was bankers and doctors. The team also
here in town to play Wayne. A week got an official name, The Wayne
later he notes that the Wayne team Stars. The later 1890s was hard on
beat the Dexter team. These early the Stars however, a string of losses
teams were just a loose band of 9 or actually meant the team disbanded
10 men who would get together to around the turn of the century. A few
have a little fun. In the early 1880s years later the team restarted again,
the Wayne team, consisting of six and in 1907 built another ballfield
Stellwagen brothers played and beat near main and Michigan Avenue,
a Detroit based team. That Detroit later where West Side Jr. High/Board
team would later become the Tigers. of Education building was. The team
In 1889 the Wayne team played and played well and in 1915, after win-
beat the Detroit Athletic Club. Other ning a game in Detroit the entire
towns had their own teams as well, town greeted the team when they re-
including Dearborn, Wyandotte, Ply- turned by train. Wayne’s town base-
mouth, New Boston, Belleville and Wayne team of 1907. ball team seems to have tapered off
Willow. It appears that the Wayne Mrs. Chaffee $20.17 for new match- field in front of the Michigan Central after this, and they dissolved some-
team got serious in 1894, paying ing uniforms. They also built a ball- Railroad depot, today this is the site time in the late teens or early 1920s.
10 · April 2019 · The Wayne Dispatch
