During the years that baseball’s spring training was held in Hot Springs there was much correspondence between the teams that trained here and Stephen E. Dillon, the General Manager of the Hot Springs Utilities Company that owned the baseball practice fields. The following letters include correspondence to Mr. Dillon from several of those teams. View […]
It was in Hot Springs, Arkansas on March 17, 1918 that the legendary Babe Ruth altered the course of baseball history. As far back as 1886, the Chicago White Stockings (later known as the Cubs) came to Hot Springs for spring training. Those were the old days before Florida and Arizona, with even warmer temperatures, […]
Nearly a century ago the springtime mecca for many major league players was a spa in Arkansas. Some players evidently found this schedule a little too strenuous and took the streetcar instead of the “lively run” from the ballpark back to the hotel. Tebeau subsequently instructed the streetcar conductors not to give rides to players […]
Future Hall of Famer Leo “The Lip” Durocher came to Hot Springs as the new manager of the Brooklyn Dodgers in February of 1939 when he brought the team’s pitchers and catchers to town to get them in shape for the upcoming season. The team arrived in town on a Friday and Saturday found them […]
Babe Ruth was a frequent visitor to Hot Springs from his rookie season with the Boston Red Sox to his glory years with the New York Yankees. Many ballplayers enjoyed the “boiling baths” while visiting the Spa City but none made the process more interesting, and entertaining, than the Sultan of Swat, Babe Ruth. As […]