Worcester Agricultural Fairgrounds was a site in

Worcester, Massachusetts Worcester ( , ) is the List of municipalities in Massachusetts, second-most populous city in the U.S. state of Massachusetts and the list of United States cities by population, 113th most populous city in the United States. Named after Worcester ...

, in the 19th century. The grounds are mainly known for having hosted the Worcester Worcesters, a

professional baseball Professional baseball is organized baseball in which players are selected for their talents and are paid to play for a specific team or club system. It is played in baseball league, leagues and associated farm teams throughout the world. Moder ...

team of the

National League National League often refers to: *National League (baseball), one of the two baseball leagues constituting Major League Baseball in the United States and Canada *National League (division), the fifth division of the English football (soccer) system ...

from 1880 to 1882. As a major-league

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, the site is usually referred to as Agricultural County Fair Grounds or Worcester Driving Park.

Location

The site was bounded by Highland Street (north), Sever Street (east), Cedar Street (south), and Agricultural (later Russell) Street (west). The grounds were just east of the large public park called Elm Park. Today, the former fairgrounds property contains a grid of streets, and many homes and businesses, including the now closed Becker College.

History

The Fairgrounds were home to an agricultural fair and to a horse trotting track, usually called the Driving Park. "

Driving Driving is the controlled operation and movement of a land vehicle, including cars, motorcycles, trucks, and buses. A driver's permission to drive on public highways is granted based on a set of conditions being met, and drivers are required to ...

" was a commonly used synonym for trotting, long before the term came to be associated primarily with the not-yet-invented automobile. The Driving Park opened in May 1872, and hosted baseball by August of that year. Horse racing at the grounds took place as late as July 1894, but appears to have ceased after that time due to local officials disallowing "pool-selling" (gambling) on races.

Professional baseball

Driving Park hosted some

games prior to Worcester acquiring its own franchise. These included an exhibition between the National Association (NA) pennant winner Boston Red Stockings and runner-up Philadelphia Whites, played on October 30, 1873, after the end of the season—Boston prevailed, 15–9, before a crowd of 2,000. A regular-season NA contest was held at Driving Park on October 30, 1874, between Boston and the Hartford Dark Blues. Hartford won, 17–11, in front of a crowd of 500. The Worcester Worcesters competed in 1879 in a later National Association (unrelated to the earlier NA), then for three seasons, 1880 to 1882, in the major-league

(NL). On June 12, 1880, Worcester pitcher

Lee Richmond J. Lee Richmond (May 5, 1857 – October 1, 1929) was an American pitcher in Major League Baseball. He played for the Boston Red Stockings, Worcester Worcesters, Providence Grays, and Cincinnati Red Stockings, and is best known for pitching the ...

threw the first perfect game in major-league history. There is a granite post commemorating the perfect game on the former Becker College campus. The park was also the site of the first, true major league doubleheader. For the price of a single game, Worcester fans saw two games against the

Providence Grays The Providence Grays were a Major League Baseball team based in Providence, Rhode Island who played in the National League from until . The Grays played at the Messer Street Grounds in the Olneyville neighborhood. The team won the National ...

on September 25, 1882. The last game for the local major-league club was played on September 29, 1882, with

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defeating Worcester, 10–7. But it was not the last major-league game in Worcester; five years later, on August 17, 1887, the fairgrounds hosted an NL game between Washington and

Boston Boston is the capital and most populous city in the Commonwealth (U.S. state), Commonwealth of Massachusetts in the United States. The city serves as the cultural and Financial centre, financial center of New England, a region of the Northeas ...

. The contest—to make up a previously postponed game in the

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—was played in Worcester at the recommendation of Washington manager John Gaffney, who had grown up in Worcester. Boston won, 6–5.

References

{{Worcester Worcesters

External links

* Game logs at

Retrosheet Retrosheet is a 501(c)(3) non-profit organization whose website features box scores of Major League Baseball (MLB) games from 1906 to the present, and play-by-play narratives for almost every contest since the 1930s. It also includes scores fr ...

1874
1872 establishments in Massachusetts 1894 disestablishments in Massachusetts Baseball in Worcester, Massachusetts Sports venues in Worcester, Massachusetts Defunct baseball venues in Massachusetts Defunct horse racing venues in Massachusetts Fairgrounds in the United States