By John Ellis Kordes
Village Historian

Q: I had heard there once was a major league baseball game played in Garden City. Is that true and, if so, could you tell me why?

One of the most important things I try to convey when I’m discussing Garden City’s history is just how many exciting things have happened here. Today, what appears to be a tranquil bedroom community has a lot of stories lying just beneath the surface. In my documentary film, “A.T. Stewart’s Garden City”, I explore many of these stories that make Garden City so unique (yes, it’s a plug).

In any event, the above question is one of my favorite as I am a huge baseball fan (Let’s Go Mets!). Remember the movie “Field of Dreams” when those ball players from long ago walk out of that cornfield in Iowa? One of them was the renowned “Shoeless Joe Jackson.” He became infamous in the 1919 “Black Sox” scandal that rocked the baseball world. He and others on the Chicago White Sox were accused of “throwing” the 1919 World Series.

Well, what does all this have to do with Garden City? These very same Chicago White Sox came to Garden City two years earlier in 1917. They came here just after their victory over the N.Y. Giants in the 1917 World Series. Major League Baseball had arranged with the U.S. Military for the two teams to come out to Garden City on Tuesday October 16, 1917 to play an exhibition game at St. Paul’s School field to entertain the troops at Camp Mills. Camp Mills was established in August of that year in the southeastern section of Garden City after the U.S. entered World War I. The camp was south of Commercial Avenue and east of Clinton Road across the barren plains.

On that sunny, warm October day, back in 1917, Garden City hosted the Chicago White Sox and N.Y. Giants in an exhibition baseball game. The troops lined the field along with many residents and St. Paul’s students to watch the game and, for a brief magical afternoon, the St. Paul’s Field was transformed into a “field of dreams”. The baseball diamond back then was just west of today’s fieldhouse and faced Stewart Avenue. A photo of the game taken from the roof of St. Paul’s does exist. The final score of the game was the White Sox 6 and the Giants 3. Since then, the Chicago White Sox have never won another World Series.

Soon after the game, the Rainbow Division (as they were known) was shipped off to Europe and thousands were killed in the fierce fighting over there. For many of the soldiers, this baseball game played that October day was the last of America they would ever see.