The Montgomery advertiser., 1903-09-26
MONTGOMERY WILL HAv1
 TEAM NEXT SEASON.

Major E. E. Winters General Manager of the Montgomery Traction Company, said yesterday that the friends of pro- fessional baseball in Montgomery need not be discouraged by the passage of the bill prohibiting baseball games on Sun day;
 on donmsnt ns an of baseSai by Montgomery M This city will have a team in the Southern League next season, Sunday baseball or no Sunday baseball. If the Montgomery
 Baseball Association gives up on account of prohibition of Sunday games, the Trac- ton Company will support the team and take active management of 1t.
 We have too much at stake to give up. We have provided a park and a grand stand and we have provided car service, We believe. the patrons of the erafion of Sunday games, and nothing can defeat our purpose to maintain team here next year"
 While Sunday baseball during the sea son just closed made it the most profit able ever known in the history of the game in Montgomery, it will be seen that a team will be in Montgomery next sea- tirely different in Montgomery in base ball way as to be barely recognizable. In former years, before the Montgomery Street Railway changed hands, ana a, be- tion Company, promoters of baseball in Montgomery had to depend entirely on their own resources. Under the old con- ditions the Montgomery Street Railway refused absolutely not only to give any financial aid, but to take even the least shadow of interest in baseball The sum of SEQ 2 game was ,1s,, aiways % the nmit an.0 or cial aid
 Now the round trip of one single car with only an average crowd will be $5. The old company always claimed that it was taking too many chances and fatly refused to go beyond the $2.50. except in one instance when 1t advanced money to Ted Sullivan and with several other Mont gomerians lost the entire sum.
 The enterprise of the Montgomery Trac- ton Company jumped at the chance to get in on the baseball ground floor The miliar to everybody interested in Mont gomery baseball affairs. At the Birm- ingham meeting of the Southern League
 the Montgomery franchise in the South
 ern League was put jointly into the hands | of w. H. Ragland and Raphael Semmes at the request of Mir. Semmes. This ar
 and bitter fight made on the Southern
 League by Charley Frank and his or ganization in Memphis. Gen. Sam Carnes
 of Memphis. as well as Frank Jones of
 the Memphis Street Railway System, MT.
 Billings, the millionaire horseman of Chi cago, and other monied men of Memphis.
 were behind Frank and his outlaw or- ganization. There was unlimited capital | back of the outlaws and jusA how near | they came to sapping the lifeblood out
 of organized baseball is a matter of his-
 tory so well known as not to need re- | threshing.
 The franchise in the old Southern League had been granted to MT. Rag land by his friend, Judge Kavanaugh,
 gomery was one of the towns included
 in Franks outlaw league and General 1 Carnes, a lifelong friend of MT. Semmes.
 had the outlaw franchise here put in his | hands Mr Sammaa at that time General Manager of the Montgomery Street Railway, which had changed hands and was owned and controlled by Richard Tillis.
 Mir. Ragland was President of the Mont gomery Traction Company which had just
 completed the Pickett Springs line. Af- | ter a number of attempts to make satis-
 factory arrangements in regard to the | joint Montgomery franchise. all of which | failed, Caruthers Ewing of Memphis, for l merly with Franks outlaw league, and Association, at the February meeting of the Southern League in New Orleans.
 forced MT. Semmes to sell his interest land. The money for the purchase was l advanced by the Traction Company, the agreement being that all games should
 The purchase money has since been re- | funded to the Traction Company. Then the Traction Company built the
 handsome grounds & and d. gran grandstand at at
 did not own any of the stock in the local | Baseball Association, but leased the grounds to the Association for a number | of years, with the proviso that the games should always be played on their line. | It proved a more profitable investment for the Traction Company than the off, cials of the company expected.
 As stated in yesterdays Advertiser the | local franchise is owned by stock com pany, the Traction Company not owning any of the stock, and unless this stock | company is dissolved, the same company | will have the franchise next season. | No definite action will be taken until l after the meeting of the present Baseball Association and possibly not until after the preliminary meeting of the Southern | League in October.