The Southwestern Illinois Inter-City Baseball League, otherwise known as the I-C, was a semi-pro and amateur farm league throughout the Metro-East area of Southwestern Illinois, including teams from Clinton, Madison, Monroe and St. Clair Counties over its lifetime. The league ran from 1931 until the mid-1970s.((The exact date when it was absorbed by another league or dissolved unknown.)) Throughout its tenure, the league fostered the talents of numerous players who moved up into the Minor and Major Leagues. Additionally, the success of the I-C aligned with the interest of Metro-East communities as well as broader economic and social trends.<\/p>\n
The creation of the Missouri-Illinois League in April of 1903 precipitated the I-C, the Mo-Il league was commonly referred to as the “Trolley League,” as “most clubs [were] in nearly every instance backed by the city railway companies in their respective cities.”((When the I-C was created the Missouri-Illinois League was commonly referred to as the \u201cOld Trolley League\u201d by newspapers. Additionally, many later Illinois papers no longer refer to the league as the Missouri-Illinois League but instead refer to it as the Illinois-Missouri League. All three names were used interchangeably in sources. The St. Joseph Herald <\/em>(St. Joseph, Missouri), <\/em>\u201cTrolley Car League<\/a>\u201d Jan 28 1894, (accessed April 3, 2020).)) The newly minted professional Trolley League organizers, led by Tom Cahill (the league president), drafted a constitution and a schedule, and agreed to salary limits.((The constitution was likely copied from other minor league constitutions, as the St. Louis Globe Democrat <\/u>wrote, \u201cThe constitution recommended was adopted without change. It being the customary one with the minor leagues,\u201d The entirety of the first season schedule is listed by the, St. Louis Globe-Democrat<\/em> (St. Louis, Missouri), \u201cTrolley League Organized: Officers Selected and a Constitution, By-Laws and Schedule Adopted<\/a>\u201d January 25 1903, (accessed April 3, 2020); St. Louis Post-Dispatch<\/em>, \u201cRising Players in Trolley League<\/a>\u201d June 10 1906, (accessed April 3, 2020).)) In its opening season, the league contained six teams, one each from East. St. Louis, Belleville, Alton<\/a>, St. Charles, and two teams from St. Louis. By its third season, the league was touted as “semi-professional” and “\u2026a kindgergarten [sic] for the development of minor-league baseball talent. Nearly every minor league in the West has recruited from this league for the coming season.”((Alton Evening Telegraph<\/em>, \u201cTrolley League\u2019s Talent in Demand<\/a>\u201d Feb 3 1906, (accessed April 3, 2020).))\u00a0 By 1909 the Trolley League had grown in popularity and size, running a season with ten teams sponsored by local towns and neighborhoods, such as Gillespie Blues, Mount Olive, Staunton, Hyde Park, and The Mound Citys. While the other four teams were sponsored by local businesses or clubs as indicated by their team names such as the Funsten Brothers, Repples, Stan Rep, H.P. Parts, and the Partridge Club.((All of the teams with the exception of Staunton had players listed on the All-Star roster for the 1909 season, see the, St. Louis Post-Dispatch<\/em>, \u201cTrolley league<\/a>,\u201d Aug 27 1909,\u00a0(accessed April 10, 2020). For a full schedule of the 1909 baseball season of the Trolley League, see the, St. Louis Globe Democrat, <\/em>\u201cOfficial Schedule Trolley League For 1909<\/a>,\u201d April 04 1909, (accessed 5-29-2020), also in the same edition of the St. Louis Globe Democrat <\/em>is information about which teams owned their own fields and which teams would be \u201cleant\u201d a field for the season, since teams sponsored by industry rather than towns did not have access to municipal fields, see, \u201cTrolley League Opens April 18<\/a>,\u201d April 04 1909, (accessed 5-29-2020). Staunton and Mount Olive were teams housed in Illinois, while Gillespie, Mound City, Hyde Park were all Missouri teams. It is unclear whether Partridge referred to Partridge, Illinois just outside of Peoria, Illinois.)) Moreover, by the late 1920s, interest in forming more teams in the Illinois Metro-East region had risen.<\/p>\n While local interest in cheap outdoor sporting events continued to rise throughout the early \u201820s, after the financial collapse of 1929 occurred leading to the Great Depression, larger national professional Class-A and B baseball leagues thinned in the wake of the massive economic and social upheaval. Spurred by the desire for recreational space, residents throughout the Illinois Metro-East aggressively expanded outdoor parks, playgrounds, and sponsored low-cost community activities.<\/p>\n For example, it was not financially viable for municipal governments in the Alton and Wood River areas to build parks due to decreases in tax revenue during the depression. Instead, parks were established from donations and the efforts of local clubs like the Kiwanis, businesses, Shurtleff College, and through the collective efforts of local neighborhood initiatives.((Activities listed in 1932 from the previous year included a variety of community activities to make use of the newly created spaces: such as Easter egg hunts, plays, contests, multiple baseball leagues, Horseshoe league, encouraged picnicking, tennis courts, gymnasiums and municipal golf courses. Alton Evening Telegraph, <\/em>\u201c1,964 Enroll in Year for Playgrounds: Total attendance during 1931, was 48,831 Says Report, Movement Expands<\/a>,\u201d Apr 1 1932, (accessed April 17, 2020).)) As part of this broader push for an expansion of local parks and their services, increasing numbers of recreational leagues emerged throughout 1929 into 1932.((With the creation of parks, youth leagues appear to have increased first, followed by the emergence of the I-C which held its first game in 1931. The youth teams in Alton were divided into two leagues \u2013 by geographic location to prevent transportation issues between a Telegraph League which consisted of Upper Alton District \u201cteams from Clara Barton, Milton, and Horace Mann,\u201d while the other League would be comprised of \u201cMcKinley, Kiwanis Watertower, Washington and St. Patrick\u2019s will be in the other,\u201d the recreational organizers stated that this was to prevent \u201ca large part of cross-town transportation\u201d since games would be played five days a week. For more on the start of youth league playground loops see, The Edwardville Intelligencer, <\/em>\u201cBaseball Loop of Playground Teams Planned: Boys 14 to 17 years to Take Part in Schedule<\/a>,\u201d Jun 21 1930, (accessed March 28, 2020);\u00a0 the year prior to the I-C a smaller league circuit developed, called the \u201cSouthwestern Illinois Baseball League,\u201d planning for the league which had begun in 1929 was conducted by \u201cthe following officers and club representatives: Simon Kellermann jr., Edwardsville<\/a>, President: Clarence H. Hale, East Alton<\/a>, First Vice President: Willard C. Moser, Staunton Second Vice President: George W. Hartung, Edwardsville, Secrectary: John F. Schneeberger, Belleville, Treasurer; J.W. Kelly, East Alton; Fred G. Dietiker, Staunton; L.P. Owsley, Alton; Dennis Hentz, Edwardsville; William Klotz, Belleville: Ed Brzostowski, East St. Louis.\u201d[7] Alton Evening Telegraph<\/em>, \u201cSouthwestern Illinois Baseball League to Open Season May 5<\/a>,\u201d Mar 23 1929,\u00a0 (accessed April 17, 2020).))<\/p>\n One such league, The Southwestern Inter-City Baseball League (I-C) was established in 1931 part of the recreational revitalization following economic decline. What set the I-C apart from other local leagues such as the “American Diamond Ball league,” “National Diamond Ball League,” and the “Twilight League,” was its “professional” rather than “recreational” status as a Class-D minor league organization.((A list of recreational leagues was found in the Alton Evening Telegraph, <\/em>\u201cStanding of Recreational Leagues,\u201d Jul 3 1929; For more on the start of the \u201cTwilight League\u201d see, Alton Evening Telegraph, <\/em>\u201cTwilight Baseball league to Open Season Monday<\/a>,\u201d May 18 1929,\u00a0 (accessed April 17, 2020).)) While teams in the I-C were professional, meaning their players were paid and had local-team contracts, they were not sponsored by or affiliated with major league teams, nor were they considered direct \u201cfeeder\u201d teams for the majors. The leagues at this level had their own localized hierarchies and determined their own rules and bylaws. And in line with the community-oriented approach towards recreation, even the league’s name was determined by the community through a public competition. The winner of the naming contest would win a season pass to the entirety of the first season.((The Edwardsville Intelligencer, <\/em>\u201cCollinsville Boy Wins Prize in Naming League<\/a>,\u201d Mar 19 1931, (accessed March 26 2020).)) On March 19, 1931, a month before the official start of the league, Collinsville<\/a> resident Charles F. Chiado was announced as the winner by league president Vernon Lucas. Chiado’s suggestion of “Southwestern Illinois Inter-City Baseball League” was the winning name. Teams were to follow the league bylaws but were able to contract individual players and establish their own admissions fees for games. Furthermore, while the bylaws did not explicitly exclude people of color from participation, the league was segregated, and participating towns like Alton had separate “negro” baseball teams or leagues, celebrated during the expansion of the playground system in the early 30s.((Many of these parks and \u201cplayground\u201d collectives and the organizations that surrounded them were segregated. Alton had an outdoor \u201cPlayground Baseball League,\u201d presumably used by white residents and a separate \u201cNegro Indoor Baseball League\u201d for black residents, see the Alton Evening Telegraph, <\/em>\u201c1,964 Enroll in Year for Playgrounds: Total attendance during 1931, was 48,831 Says Report, Movement Expands<\/a>,\u201d Apr 1 1932. (accessed April 17, 2020); No information has yet been located that identifies when the league became integrated.)) The I-C organization consisted of a Board of Arbitration with elected officials who served five-year terms.((This league organization is based on a 1964 newspaper article which describes the organization, members of the board in \u201964 were William Morris, Mike Semanisin, James Delbert Hackeney and Charles Brisky. The Board was presided over by Vernon Lucas, the league president. See, The Edwardsville Intelligencer, <\/em>\u201cSouthwestern Inter-City League Has Eight Teams, Edwardsville Out<\/a>,\u201d March 19 1964, \u00a0(accessed Mar 26, 2020).)) It also had four executive officers, a President, Vice President, Secretary-Treasurer, and an elected statistician.((In 1960 the Board of Arbitration still had only three members, so between 60-64 the league changed the number of Arbitration officials.\u00a0 The Edwardsville Intelligencer, <\/em>\u201cDiamond Action Starts April 24<\/a>,\u201d April 5 1960, (accessed Mar 27, 2020).))<\/p>\n