The Birth of Central Texas Baseball

They called it "The Year of the Great Blizzards."

In early January of 1888, a blizzard swept across Montana, Minnesota, Nebraska and Kansas before dipping into Texas. More than 240 people perished. Among them, throngs of school children walking home in blinding snows.

Months later, a second blizzard blanketed the East Coast, taking with it more than 400 lives.

Around the country, the Football League was formed. The San Francisco Examiner published Ernest Thayer's epic poem, Casey at the Bat. Democratic incumbent Grover Cleveland won the popular vote for president, but lost out to Benjamin Harrison in the Electoral College.

Jack the Ripper's rampage began and ended in London and Dutch painter Vincent Van Gogh famously lanced off part of his left ear.

Tris Speaker, Duffy Lewis and Zack Wheat - all future Baseball Hall of Famers - were all born.

Coca-Cola founder John Stith Pemberton and Little Women author Louisa May Alcott died.

It was a Leap Year that came just over a decade after the first professional baseball team visited Texas when, in 1877, Indianapolis pitcher 'The Only Nolan' fanned 26 of 27 Galveston amateur batters he faced, helping the visitors trounce their coastal foes.

Professional baseball in Texas had taken root.

By 1887, several baseball aficionados had begun talks with businessmen around the state, all hoping to form a profitable and successful league to join the 17 others already formed around the country.

In 1888, insurance man Fred Turner was elected president of the inaugural Texas League with railroad executive Robert Adair serving as vice president. The Austin Senators, Dallas Hams, Ft. Worth Panthers, Galveston Giants, Houston Babies and San Antonio formed the six-team league. Salaries were capped at $1,000 per club.   

Austin's William "Farmer" Weaver led the league with 90 hits and 66 runs in 76 games as more and more amateur teams sprouted up in towns like Corsicana, Shreveport, Temple and Waco.

But financial woes, combined with travel worries and a poor infrastructure, collapsed the league by 1891.

The roots began branching outward, though, and by the early 1950s more than 100 Texas towns had fielded teams in a bevy of leagues across the states. From Lamesa to Lufkin, Wink to Winters, Plainview to Port Arthur and Ennis to El Paso, baseball had become a staple in the Lone Star State.

Perhaps no minor league team in the state's cherished baseball history left a more lasting mark than the 1959 Austin Senators. One year after finishing 12 games behind Corpus Christi in the Texas League, the Senators racked up an 80-66 record with former Major League pitcher Ernie White skippering the team.

Howie Bedell led the Senators and the league with 194 hits and former University of Texas star Charlie Gorin fanned a league-high 174 batters and spun the league's only no-hitter that season - a 2-0 win over the Mexico City Diablos Rojos in Pan-American play.

The Senators bounded into the post-season, taking two of three games from Tulsa before trouncing San Antonio in three straight games to give Austin its first professional baseball championship since the Dead Era.

It would be 45 years before Central Texas claimed another Texas League title.

The Express will honor the 1959 Austin Senators on July 17-19. Click here for details on the event.