CLEARFIELD – It might be football season according to the calendar, but more than four dozen former Clearfield Area High School baseball players will be digging out their bats and gloves again this week for the fourth annual Bison Alumni Games Saturday at the Lawrence Township Recreation Park diamond.
Special recognition will go to players on the 1978 team (24-7) on the 30th anniversary of the first southern trip and its District 9 championship, the 1983 team (25-7) on the 25th anniversary of its Central Penn League title and the 1988 team (14-8) on the 20th anniversary of \”THE GAME,\” a 9-7, 15-inning thriller against DuBois for the District 9 Class AAA crown.
The Clearfield Baseball Association fund-raiser has evolved into a full weekend, with a two-man scramble golf outing at the Clearfield-Curwensville Country Club Friday afternoon a new feature this year.
Also planned for Friday are batting practice at 6 p.m. at the Lawrence Township Rec Park Field and a draft social at 8 o\’clock at the former Adventure Park on Carbon Mine Road.
Committee members hope to distribute as many shirts and caps as possible that evening.
They would like the ex-Bisons who plan to show up only on Saturday to report by 10:30 a.m. for caps, shirts and team assignments.
The Old-Timers Home Run Derby is set for 11 o\’clock.
All participants are encouraged to be on hand by 11:30 for pictures so that the Old-Timers Alumni Game, which has a two-hour time limit, can get under way at 11:45.
Following at 2 p.m. will be the Youngsters Home Run Derby.
The first pitch for the Youngsters Alumni Game tentatively is booked for 2:30.
Approximately 30 to 60 minutes after the final out, everybody will descend on Adventure Park for dinner and a night of rehashing the day\’s action, sharing memories and reminiscing.
Sure to be discussed a lot will be the first southern trip – destination Williamston, N.C.
\”We were the first team around here that took a trip like that,\” longtime Clearfield coach Sid Lansberry recalls. \”I don\’t know of any other team that went south before we did.
\”I got the idea talking to Jerry Bickel, who was playing at Clarion at the time. He showed me some films he took when he was in Florida and said what a great trip it was.
\”He said all the colleges were doing that, and I got to thinking, \’Why couldn\’t we do that, although maybe not to Florida?\’
\”I had a directory of schools in North Carolina, and I just started writing to coaches. The Williamston coach (Dink Mills) was the first to write back and said they’d be interested in playing us and that he would line us up with other schools.
\”We had six games scheduled, and the last one got rained out. We ended up 3-2 on the trip against good teams. Williamston had won the state title in Class AAA the year before. Another team was in the state finals, too.\”
At that time, the Pennsylvania Interscholastic Athletic Association had no limit for games, and Lansberry tried to book extra non-league games which included those played on the southern trip.
\”I figured the more games we played the better,\” he said. \”We scheduled a lot of Saturday double-headers, and we continued to do that until the (PIAA) limit came down to 20 games in 1985.\”
Although the Bisons returned to North Carolina for a few years and have gone to Virginia ever since, except for one year to South Carolina, Lansberry says there has been nothing to equal that first trip.
\”A lot of stuff happened, a lot of funny things,\” he noted. \”My car broke down on the way and Rod Frisco and I spent the night in a gas station in Richmond.\”
Frisco, now with the Harrisburg Patriot-News, was a young sports writer for The Progress in Clearfield and chronicled that event in a column when he returned.
Lansberry added, \”The guy at the gas station stayed open until his mechanic fixed the car, and we got to the motel (in Williamston, N.C.) about 15 minutes before our first game.
\”Then, I got thrown out of the first game after it had already ended. We sent up a batter to pinch-hit and he reported to the official scorer and they even announced his name on the PA system. But he didn\’t report to the umpire-in-chief. The other coach protested, and the umpire called him out before a pitch was thrown. The tying run was on second, and we lost 7-6.
\”Technically, that was the rule back then. I protested and got thrown out, but I told the umpire, \’You can\’t, the game\’s over.\’
\”That was our introduction to the South. But we got treated really well everywhere we went.
\”That was quite a trip!\”
It\’s certain that story will be embellished a little Saturday night.
Any former Bisons interested in participating should call Lansberry at 765-5449, assistant coach Donnie Shimmel at 857-7806, assistant coach Brian Barr at 762-3278 or Clearfield Baseball Association secretary-treasurer Jeff Kavelak at 765-5088.