Peninsula In Passage

Did You Know?

Spring Training In 1948 Emil Bossard and George Toma, the two inaugural inductees to the Major League Baseball Groundskeeper Hall of Fame, came to Driver, at the request of the Cleveland Indians, to build two minor league training fields at Monogram Field, the deactivated Naval air base. Toma has more recently found fame as the grounds keeping guru of the Super Bowl. When the field was complete, the Indians sent their AAA farm team (named the Baltimore Orioles) there for spring training for at least one year. John Eberwine, then about 12, was one of numerous youngsters who hung around the training camp and he’s got the lumber to prove it. According to Eberwine the players and staff gave the broken or cracked wooden bats to the kids watching the practices and he still treasures those Louisville Sluggers.

John Eberwine

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