Tenney: Baseball on the hill in Morenci, Arizona

From SABR member John Tenney at Base Ball in Arid Land on January 19, 2015:

Early on, copper mining towns like Morenci didn’t have enough flat area to host a baseball grounds. After underground mining produced enough raw earth, or slag, that was separated from the ore extracted from the grounds the pilings served as a foundation to build a baseball park upon.  Until then, interest in baseball ran high but was impractical until a home ground could be built for practice and games.

This photo, taken sometime in 1915, roughly shows another outside view of the baseball grounds at the Old Detroit Copper Company mine.  Usually, slag piles like this one take about 20 years to create. This one may have been started as early as 1895.   The photo below comes from a baseball game program printed on a Highschool Football program between Clifton and Morenci circa 1981.

Read the full article here: http://baseballinaridland.blogspot.com/2015/01/baseball-on-hill-in-morenci.html



Originally published: January 20, 2015. Last Updated: January 20, 2015.