Baseball in Appalachia

A minor league baseball treasure resides in the heart of Appalachia.  West Virginia may be known for its natural resources—coal, logging, natural gas—but its roots in baseball date back more than 100 years.  Charleston began its professional baseball history in 1910...

How the Great Falls Voyagers Got Their Name

More than a moniker, the name of a sports team may reflect local history, culture, and myth.  Baseball, certainly, has contributed to this linguistic equation. San Diego is the site of the first Franciscan mission, hence the name Padres. The West Virginia Power, the...

Lonesome Rhodes, Will Stockade, and Andy Taylor

Corruption rooted in ego, fame, and power forms the foundation for A Face in the Crowd, a 1957 film; Budd Schulberg wrote the screenplay based on his short story The Arkansas Traveler. Andy Griffith stars as Lonesome Rhodes, a country bumpkin discovered by television...