Baseball in Riverhead

August 3, 2020
cbkretz
Newspaper headline from 1950 stating "Satchel Paige to pitch at Riverhead."
Riverhead County Review, July 20, 1950. From NYS Historic Newspapers.

A July night at Riverhead Stadium in 1950. Two baseball legends face each other without even realizing it. Satchel Paige, fabled Negro League pitcher, is on the mound for the Philadelphia Stars. Young Carl Yastrzemski Jr. is in the stands, cheering for his dad on the Riverhead Falcons. The sellout crowd in a stadium barely a year old is a testamant to the long history and deep popularity of baseball in the area.

Fabio Montella of Suffolk County Community College recounts the story of that night and of baseball in Riverhead. Riverhead Stadium was just the latest iteration of a long-standing connection to the sport.

Editor’s Note: we mention in this interview stories of Satchel Paige putting out lit matches with his pitches. While Paige was an amazing pitcher, Fabio updates us to note that accounts show Paige throwing pitches over a book of matches arranged on home plate but they were not lit or set up to be extinguished.

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