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The city of Hays has a long-standing baseball history. Records show that the game was played as early as 1869 as a team of soldiers from Fort Hays challenged the Hays Town Team to a game. Photographs have been found as early as 1901 of the Hays Team. From 1869 to 1945, the team went by the name of The Hays Town Team and was sponsored by various organizations and businesses in Hays. Box scores have been found from as early as 1877.

During the 1946 season the team started as the Hays Town Team, but before the end of the season became known as the Hays Larks. The Larks name was penned by Mrs. Bill Downs in 1946 during a “name the team“ contest.

During the 40’s, the current baseball stadium came into being and fans flocked to the games, lining the foul lines with their cars and picnic blankets and chairs. Kids hustled after foul balls for a nickel and ran up and down the cars looking for empty pop bottles for a rebate of 2¢. The players responded with outstanding games including games with the Kansas City Monarchs and Satchel Paige and the House of David teams. Every means was used to make sure the games were played including burning a flooded infield to insure a game with the House of David would go on as scheduled.

Players shining druing those years included Glassman, Walters, Les Pelzel, Tony Ruder, Marvin “Lefty“ Dreiling, “Lefty“ Braun, Hilary Schumacher, Tony “Red“ Pfeifer, Hess Ruder, Bill Walters, Ed Wasinger and Earl Hobbs, who years later lured New Yorker Frank Leo to Hays and insured the success of the Larks teams into the future. During the 1941 season pitcher Ed Leiker won an astonishing 18 games and fanned 226 batters, both still team records. In 1948, the team lost one of their best when Ed Walters, then only 31, was electrocuted while working.
The 30’s and 40’s were arguably the heyday of semi-professional baseball in the Hays area as every town had teams and their fans follwed them faithfully. Victoria, Catherine, Severin, Loretto, Pfeifer, Good Hope, and Antonio all had teams and outstanding ballplayers and the competition was fierce at most games. Also during most of the 40’s, there was the Hays Junior Larks which added to the rivalries.

With the advent of television and major league games coming into homes in the early 50’s baseball seemed to be dying in many towns and even Dusty hung it up in 1953 and in one of his last games as manager led his team to win a pinch hit home run. In 1954, Albert “Jay“ Schyler as manager and Duane Goodwin as president of the Hays Baseball Association stepped in to revive the Hays Larks. Goodwin not only served as president but everything from there on down including selling tickets at the gate. A band of new outstanding players emerged including several from the late 40’s, “Red“ Pfeifer and John Roth and newcomers, Norman “Raschi“ Pfeifer, John Jacobs, Clair Dome, Arlen Walters, Jim Maska, Les Herman, Jim Casper, John Floyd, Merle Hergert, John Karlin, Vic Higgins and pitcher Don “Andy“ Reigel.

Reigel made history in 1956 by pitching an afternoon game right handed and a night game left handed winning both. During those years, Higgins and Karlin had banner seasons of .458 and .439 batting averages, respectively. The 1957 team capped the decade by placing 4th at the Wichita State Tournament, the higest a Hays team had achieved to that point in time.