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EXCELSIOR OF ALBANY
The Excelsior Base
Ball Club of Albany had a brief existence that ended in mystery. Nevertheless
they deserve to be remembered because they serve as a reminder that the most
imposing challenge that early clubs often faced was finding anyone willing to
play them.
The Excelsior club
was organized on May 12, 1856, during what proved quite an active year for
baseball in Albany. The Excelsiors faced the Empire Club of Albany in their
first match and won. That seems to have ended the ambitions of the Empire Club,
but another new club was soon formed to challenge the Excelsiors for local
supremacy. In an intriguing and rather saucy move, the new club called itself
“The Rivals” but announced that they intended to take the name of Excelsior if
they won the match.
The original
Excelsior Club emerged triumphant from the match, thereby retaining local honors
and their names. The Rivals immediately issued a challenged for a rematch but
when the appointed day rolled around the challengers did not show up. That
ended the 1856 baseball season in Albany
In the spring of
1857, all signs suggested that baseball matters would be busier than ever in
Albany. The Excelsiors organized for the year on April 1, electing Walter C.
Osborn as president, Thomas L. Goodwin and George S. Dawson as vice presidents,
A. DeGraff as secretary, W. A. Van Renssaleaer as treasurer. In addition to the
five officers, the club chose a five-man board of managers that consisted of Dr.
J. L. Babcock, R. M. Sherman, J. G. Waldron, John M. Rankin, and Charles W.
Gibbs. The club also completed arrangements to use the grounds of the Albany
Cricket Club for its matches and announced itself ready to accept challenges.
All of this activity
suggests that the Excelsiors expected 1857 to be a banner year for baseball in
Albany. Instead, no challenges seem to have been forthcoming and that is the
end of the known activities of the Excelsior Base Ball Club of Albany. The
members may soon have tired of intrasquad games and turned to other forms of
recreation. But it is also entirely possible that they continued to play for
several more years, but attracted no attention.
At any rate, when a
different Excelsior Club – the mighty Excelsiors of Brooklyn – paid a visit to
Albany four years later, there was no indication that anyone remembered that a
club by that name had once been the local champions. In the ensuing years,
Albany was represented by several prominent clubs, most notably the Nationals
and Knickerbockers of Albany who flourished in the late 1860s. But the
Excelsior Club seems to have passed entirely from local memory.
MEMBERS
Dr. James L. Babcock: A member of the Board of Managers, Babcock was
born in 1824 in New York State, and was living in the nearby town on Bethlehem
in 1850. He moved to Albany and practiced medicine there for many years.
According to an online genealogy, he moved to Colorado and then to Humboldt,
Nebraska, where he died on April 23, 1912.
George S. Dawson:
George S. Dawson, the club’s second vice president, was born around 1839 in New
York. His father, also named George, was the proprietor of the Albany Evening
Journal, while the younger George worked as a printer. It appears that George
S. Dawson enlisted in the Civil War, but his whereabouts after that are not
known.
A. DeGraff: Degraff
was the club’s secretary, but his identity is unknown.
Charles W. Gibbs:
Charles Gibbs, a member of the club’s Board of Managers, was born around 1838 in
New York and grew up in Albany. He enlisted in the Union Army as a lieutenant
and served in the 44th New York Infantry for more than two years,
earning promotion to captain. He applied for a disability pension in 1870 and
his wife applied for a widow’s pension in 1914.
Thomas Laing
Goodwin: Goodwin, the club’s first vice president, was born on January 24, 1835,
near Albany, and moved to Albany to work as a lithographer. He and his family
eventually moved back to the small nearby town of Watervliet.
Walter C. Osborn:
Osborn was the club president. The only man by that name was born around 1834 in
New York State, served in the Civil War, and later worked as a clerk in
Binghamton.
John M. Rankin:
Another member of the Board of Managers, John Rankin was born around 1834 in New
York and would work as a clerk and later ran an advertising bureau.
R. M. Sherman: Board
of Managers, not identified
W. A. Van
Renssaleaer: treasurer, not identified
James G. Waldron:
James G. Waldron of the Board of Managers was born around 1831. Like Babcock,
he was living in the nearby town of Bethlehem in 1850 but later moved to Albany
and worked as a coal dealer.
Source: Porter’s
Spirit of the Times, May 23, 1857, from Albany Transcript
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