Archives & Special Collections recently received a delightful and interesting donation: a scorecard for the 1935 Presbyterian Hospital baseball team. Four pages long and measuring 10” by 7 ½”, it’s more substantial than these items tend to be and it contains a surprising amount of information for such an ephemeral piece.
The team played its games at Columbia’s Baker Field at 218th Street in Manhattan’s Inwood neighborhood Wednesdays at “5:15 P.M. – Twilight” and on Saturdays at 3:30. The 1935 season included nine games with such opponents as Saks, the Horn & Hardart Automat restaurant, two police precincts, and the Yonkers Doctors’ Baseball Club.
Not least of the scorecard’s charms are its advertisements for local businesses: we were especially impressed with the one from Watson McKenna Motor Co., Broadway and 166th Street, announcing that “$26 Down Buys a BRAND NEW FORD 1935 TUDOR SEDAN.” Most however are from local eateries including the Broadway Spaghetti House, Picadilly Diner, Armory Bar and Grill, and Fay’s Restaurant.
The scorecard is especially important because there is almost no documentation of sports at the Medical Center apart from medical school teams. Workplace athletic teams became steadily more common in the United States from the 1920s onward but until now we had nothing to suggest team sports were so well-organized at the Medical Center at such a comparatively early date.
