The Anaconda standard. [volume] (Anaconda, Mont.) 1889-1970, 1896-03-29
THE CRANK'S LAMENT
A Little Tale on Baseball by One Who
Loves II.
PRECIOUS TIME BEING LOST
Anaconda Could Have a Team
That Would Be a Pride to Her
Cttizens-There Must Be
No jealousy.

The reporter yesterday saw the base
ball crank. He was watching a game
Of marbles that was being played on a
vacant lot. A look of supreme dis
gust was on his face and the sarcastic
half smile on his lips showed that he
was comparing the game of marbles
with his own, well-loved baseball He
was chewing viciously on a cigar and
on seeing the reporter he said, with an
fronical ring in his tone:
See those boys? Some of them are
II and Is years old. They roll around
in the dirt with piece of sheepskin
ON their knee and shoot mud balls at a
out Of that? Not a bit Why don't
they get a ball and bat. and pretty
soon you would see a different lot of
boys"
The reporter asked him what he
thought about the prospects for a team
in Anaconda this year.
What the antipathy towards the ma
tional game of baseball in Anaconda
is" said he, us hard to say but il is
certain that the young boys and young
men Of this city do not take kindly to
the game. On every vacant lot a game
OF some kind Is in progress; here ii Is
marbles there tops; again football, but
never a sign Of the flying baseball or a
shout Of triumph over the capture of a
long fly.
This season gives every promise of
being the best baseball year the coun-
try has ever seen. In every state, save
one or two, a league of some kind has
been organized. That some of these
leagues will go under is certain, yet
their formation shows a spirit of en-
thusiasm. the lack Of which in Mon
tana is hard to explain. No exercise
can be healthier, and no sport more
fascinating than baseball In this city
there is no scarcity of players, all that
is required is a start. Every one of the
fine days passing over at this time
ought to witnes the baseball players
at practice. A few hours spent each
day at this time will return its reward
with high interest later in the sum-
mer
Every little hamlet in the East is
talking up its baseball team. The
country papers are giving the boys
every encoura cement. In few months
those same little towns will have a
team that its citizens will take pride
in. Good-natured contests with neigh
boring towns will soon be on. And let
me tell you, right here, from those lit
tie towns come the men who make the
Rusies and Van Halterns.
1T isn't the fault of the people or OF
newspapers of this region that we
don't have baseball teams. The news
papers, especially your paper, have
made every effort. and printed columns
in an edeavor to arouse a feeling of
enthusiasm in baseball The people
will support a team If the people are
given any kind of a show for their
money. And, as I've said before, the
people will be satisfied II a team shows
a desire to improve and does the best
it can. Every man in Anaconda will
go to a. baseball game IL he is half way
certain that he will see the team do
the best II can. but he won't go to wit
ness an exhibition of wrangling, rag
chewing and hear language that would
disgust a mule.
If Anaconda is to be represented on
the diamond at all this year, now is
the time to make the start. Practice,
patience and obedience to the captain
will do wonders with nine men in three
months That Anaconda can get up a
winning team has been proved in the
past. All that is needed is for every
body to work together and give jeal-
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