Baseball etched into Tecumseh’s history

Tecumseh has displayed its passion for baseball through the years by putting high school players on course for Minor League Baseball, having a suitable Little League Park for kids to cultivate their passion for baseball and softball and winning high school state titles on the softball diamond.

The town’s enthusiasm for baseball is more than a century old and may have reached its peak in the early 1900s when it had a team in the Minor League Baseball circuit for a brief period.

With baseball threaded into the culture of the town, Tecumseh bicentennial committee member Robert Elliott said it was justified to hold a vintage baseball game during the week of Tecumseh’s bicentennial celebration that takes place July 18 to July 21.

The game will be held at noon Sunday at the Tecumseh Middle School baseball field, and admission is free. Tecumseh Mayor Jack Baker will throw the first pitch. The nine-inning game will use rules from 1867 and feature the Brownstown Volunteers and the Regular Base Ball Club of Mt. Clemens.

The players will wear old-school uniforms and not use mitts. You cannot overrun the bases and catching the ball after the first bounce results in an out. There will be an announcer who will go through the rules as the game progresses.

“We’re going through our 200 years of history and how important baseball was to the city, and what tickets used to cost, and everybody used to show up.” Elliott said. “It was certainly important in the day.”

A Tecumseh team played in the Southern Michigan League — a Class D Minor League Baseball circuit — from 1906 to 1908. The squad finished first in the Southern Michigan League with a 69-42 record in 1907 — six games ahead of second-place Kalamazoo. There is information about the short-lived Tecumseh baseball club on baseballreference.com.

Other teams that Tecumseh had to outperform in the 1907 Southern Michigan League season were Battle Creek, Mt. Clemens, Bay City. Lansing, Flint and Jackson.

After Fred Merkle helped Tecumseh win its only Southern Michigan title, he played in the Majors from 1907 to 1920 and 1925 to 1926. He was a member of the New York Giants, Brooklyn Dodgers, Chicago Cubs and New York Yankees. 

“You had hometown heroes,” said Elliott, historian at the Tecumseh Historical Museum. “It was something to do on a Saturday afternoon. It would sell out and tickets weren’t that expensive and everyone got dressed for the occasion and they had cheers.”

Tecumseh had adult teams that excited the community beyond the dalliance in the Southern Michigan League.

And passion for baseball — and softball — is still alive in the town today.

Tecumseh High School has two graduates who are minor leaguers in Sam Benschoter of the Double-A Chattanooga Lookouts and Cameron Wagoner of the High-A Wisconsin Timber Rattlers.

The last Tecumseh High School team state title was won on the softball diamond in 2013 — the squad’s third in a six-year span. 

Many softball players on that team as well as accomplished baseball players over the years were developed in the 30-year-old Tecumseh Area Little League. The program holds its games at Mitchell Park in Tecumseh, which has eight ball diamonds and has hosted a Little League state championship.

Local citizens who have shown passion for Little League and high school games can check out the Tecumseh bicentennial vintage game in mid-July with two clubs of players who have passion for the sport.

“They’re fun to watch,” Elliott said. “It’s going to be pretty entertaining. So should be a good crowd. A nice day for it.”

Brownstown player Marty Bertera said his four-year-old club features 16 players ranging in age from 16- to 67-years-old. He is 67. The club has approximately 15 games per year across the Midwest and will play in Tecumseh for the first time. 

“We’re really excited,” Bertera said. “We came down there and checked it out. It’s going to be a lot of fun. We’ll put on an interesting show. We’ll play baseball just like it was meant to be played back in the day.”