A Hard-Fought Game at the Fort
In an era of segregation, a mixed baseball team narrowly edges out the Ninth Cavalry’s team at Fort Walla Walla.
The fan who stayed away from the game yesterday between a team composed of players of the late Inland Empire league and the Squadron team from Fort Walla Walla missed a rare baseball treat, the mixed team just winning out from the colored boys by a scratch. The score was 2 to 0 and the victory was due to Brown's error on third in missing a thrown ball in an endeavor to catch Stoval, who was making a steal to third, and Titus' lucky hit into the right garden, which should have been gobbled up by Bowen. The colored troopers had six errors charged up against them in the 'dope' book, but only two figured in the results. The mixed team played errorless ball except for Hogan's muffing a low fly in center. Both teams used a brace of pitchers and the kind of ball the quartet pitched may be seen at a glance at the hit column, which records but four for the two teams.
“The fan who stayed away from the game yesterday between a team composed of players of the late Inland Empire league and the Squadron team from Fort Walla Walla missed a rare baseball treat.”
This game took place during a period of intense racial segregation, yet sports provided one of the few arenas where white and Black teams interacted competitively in the Pacific Northwest. While the reporting adopts the era's patronizing language, it documents a vibrant culture of Black baseball clubs often stationed at regional military outposts like Fort Walla Walla.
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