Alaska is hosting dozens of celebrations of America’s 250th anniversary. Those include a weeklong series of events in several communities around the state recognizing the history of baseball in the Last Frontier.
Alaska State Historian Katie Ringsmuth came up with the idea of organizing the events, called The Week of Dreams. She says Alaskans began playing baseball soon after the United States bought the land from Russia.
“Alaska has a very unique connection and relationship to the game that starts out on the Pribilof Islands with the Knock 'Em Down and Skin 'Em Club, established in 1868,” she said.
That ballclub’s name derives from the way seals were harvested on St. Paul Island, where the game was played. Ringsmuth says since then, the people who came to the territory that became Alaska built baseball fields wherever they settled. Especially those who came here to mine gold.
“The mining, the old rushes kind of swept across Alaska, and they brought with them baseball,” Ringsmuth said. “And you see these fields emerge like, literally, diamonds in the rough, from Skagway to Nome to Fairbanks.”
She says baseball games provided recreation for miners who spent most of their time toiling for the precious metal. And the long summer days enabled them to play late into the night. That’s how the tradition of playing baseball in the evening took root in Fairbanks.
“The Midnight Sun game is really a product of people who came up here to work really hard, and it was the midnight sun that afforded them the time to play in the evening.”
The annual Midnight Sun Game usually starts at around 10:30 p.m. on the solstice at Growden Memorial Field in Fairbanks, the home of the Alaska Goldpanners.
“By the turn of the century, it's not really that surprising that people who came to Alaska brought with them this game that everybody loved to play. And the indigenous people in Alaska have a game they call Native baseball.”
One of the Week of Dreams events is a Native baseball game that was held Wednesday in Utqiagvik. Other events were held last week in the Anchorage area.
Another event will be held tonight in Fairbanks at the Morris Thompson Cultural and Visitors Center.
Explore Fairbanks President and CEO Scott McCrea says it’ll include a celebration of Goldpanners history that’ll feature a talk by Greg Harris, a former member of the team who went on play for Major League Baseball clubs.
“ Greg Harris, an MVP for the Goldpanners back in the day, went on to a very illustrious career in the, in the MLB,” McCrea said. “He pitched for eight different teams, including the San Diego Padres when they made it to the '84 World Series. But probably what Harris is most notable for is he’s a switch-pitcher – he can throw with either his left or right arm.”
Friday’s events include a youth clinic hosted by Major League Baseball and the Goldpanners at Growden Memorial Field.
The final America250-Alaska event will be held Saturday, July 4th, at 6 p.m., before the Goldpanners take on the San Diego Stars starting at 7 at Growden Field. McCrea says it’ll be a memorable ceremony.
“ We're unveiling two 60-foot flags. One is the America250 flag, the other's the U.S. flag. We're gonna have Athabascan fiddlers,” he said. “We've got a flyover from Eielson. It's just gonna be a great way to kind of close out the Fourth of July celebration here in Interior Alaska. Should be a great event.”
Other communities around the state also will celebrate the nation’s anniversary. In the Interior, those include a parade in North Pole with a flyover by two F-35A fighter jets from Eielson Air Force. Other events will be held in Delta Junction, Fort Greely and Tok.
