LibGuides: Western Maryland Coal Talks: Coalfield Baseball

Coal Miners and Baseball

Baseball was a vibrant force in industrial towns throughout West Virginia during the first half of the 20th century, especially in the coalfields. Coal companies looked for good players, usually rewarding them with easier jobs, shorter working hours, and time off. Coal companies financed teams to help unify their work forces in towns from Fairmont to Gary, and from Helen, Tams, Fireco, and Switchback to Eccles. There were company leagues, Negro leagues, and United Mine Workers leagues.

Coalfield Baseball

Coalfield Baseball
Overview of teams and games formed by WV coal miners from the early 1900s to the end of WWII.
Coal Camp Baseball
In the coalfields, baseball was truly America’s game. Baseball games created a community spirit, bringing together black and white, immigrant and native born. It was on the playing fields that the immigrants who came to mine coal truly be a part of America.
Lefty Grove – A Baseball Legend with Local Roots
Article by Dan Whetzel about Lefty Grove, the Major League Baseball Hall of Fame member who grew up in a
hard scrabble region where work was often
defined by long hours in underground coal
mines.
Robert Moses "Lefty" Grove
Born in Lonaconing, Maryland, Grove was a sandlot star in the Baltimore area during the 1910s. He didn't play organized baseball until he was 19 years old. He purportedly gained the ability to throw hard by hurling rocks. In 1920, he made his professional debut with the Martinsburg Mountaineers of the class-D Blue Ridge League, where he appeared in six games. He would later play for the Baltimore Orioles and the Boston Red Sox.