Monday, July 08, 2002
It's the bottom on the ninth for church league
Enquirer staff and news services
FRANKFORT, Ky. — Betty Martin stepped to the pitcher's mound at the Bridgeport Ruritan Club ball field. Martin released the ball, the batter swung and missed, and umpire Barry Devers called “strike.”
With the toss, the 2002 summer slow pitch church softball league began. Over at the concession stand, Louis Hammonds and David Marraccini waited on kids and adults. Around the tiny, grassy parking area children ran, played tag and had their own game of “ball” with crumpled cups.
For at least the past 40 years, church softball has been an integral part of summer in Bridgeport, a small western Franklin County community.
Children have grown up at the field, taking their talents from the parking area to the diamond. Parents and grandparents who played in the league — some of whom still do — are now watching as their children and grandchildren take the field.
“The club was chartered in April of 1957, I believe,” said Louis Hammonds, who for years has been vital in the church league's operation. “I think the softball program started in the early 1960s.”
As the years passed, the league grew as church teams from all over Frankfort and Franklin County came to play at Bridgeport.
“Back in the early '70s, we had 11 churches participating and each church had three teams — boys, women, and men,” Hammonds said. “We played five nights a week from May until sometimes up in September.”
But times changed with the advent of the City Recreation Department's softball program at Capitol View Park. Church teams left places like Bridgeport for newer, fancier fields.
Like most service clubs, the Bridgeport Ruritan Club is fighting a seemingly losing battle with its membership. With only 18 active members on the roster, an undertaking like the softball program is challenging.
“When I first got into the club, I wanted to help with the softball program,” Hammonds said. “Then it was fun because we had more people. Now, it's becoming something of a burden.”
Hammonds, wife Janet, and Lester Woolums have been joined occasionally by others over the past several weeks as they prepared the field and the grounds. They've mowed, laid sod and readied the concession stand.
“Every year I say this is going to be the last,” Hammonds said. “I think the people enjoy it, but it's such a chore that we don't have time to get things done at home.”
Hammonds fears the future for the league — which is annually debated at club meetings — isn't too bright.
“A lot of churches have dropped out and only a few have all three teams anymore,” he said.
For a lot of folks in the community, no slow pitch softball during the summer at Bridgeport would be tantamount to not flying the flag on the Fourth of July. But the challenges are becoming more difficult each year.
The last community-operated league in a county where there once were several, one has to wonder, after 40 years, how many more opening nights will there be at Bridgeport?
“I don't know,” said Hammonds. “If we don't get some more help how long we can continue?”
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It's the bottom on the ninth for church league