ON THE ROAD  or  WE GOT THE BASEBALL BLUES    Looking for music and baseball in Ohio and the  Appalachians by Gardog B. & Lonesome Bob We went to the minors because we wanted to see baseball in its rawest form, without all the hullabaloo that surrounds all big time sports these days. Familiar as we were  with AAA level ball in Toledo, where theMud Hens rule, we wanted to know what the people and players were like in smaller towns and on teams with lesser expectations. There are a few places in this country where there is a concentration of teams in small towns; the two

closest to us were in the New York-Penn League and the Appalachian League. Both feature the youngest of players in short season (June to August) leagues, but the remoteness of the Appalachian  Mountain region appealed to us.  Besides, Lonesome Bob has been intrigued with the coalfields of West Virginia since 1995 when Blue Suit recorded Howard Armstrong and he first heard Armstrong's stories about playing music in the coal mining region[link]. A tremendously accomplished musician, Armstrong has drawn on many different styles of music, both black  and white, jazz and blues, vaudeville and country. The origins of his eclectic influences probably arise in his multi-cultural hometown in eastern Tennessee where the Italian and Irish immigrants, the blacks and white hill folk  lived and worked side by side. This diverse ethnicity also resided in the coalfields of West Virginia. In his research into Armstrong's music Lonesome Bob came upon Nat Reese, a musician who still lives in the vicinity of the  coalfields in Princeton, WV, and who occasionally plays with Armstrong. Because Reese has lived his whole life in this region, we set out to meet him, listen to his stories, and see if he could direct us to some local music when we  weren't in the ballpark.

For his part, Gardog's interests were more basic: he was interested in a road trip with a good buddy in beautiful countryside. Baseball? Sure, he was interested in experiencing more  minor league ball. Both of us had followed baseball closely as kids, though the majors has held our interest increasingly less over the years as it has became more commercial and less accessible. Watching the Mud Hens  play has been reminiscent of the ball we watched growing up in the 60's; the players are younger, they are accessible to the fans, and they are very hungry to do well. Ned Skeldon stadium, where the Hens play, is  similar to Forbes Field where G. B. used to watch the Pirates play as a boy. For only a few dollars one can sit close to the field

and watch outstanding baseball being played.  We decided to plan our trip for maximum baseball over a three or four day span. We figured if we left Toledo on a Thursday afternoon we could  get to Columbus for the 7:05 game. We were familiar with the Columbus Clippers, the AAA affiliate of the New York Yankees, because they play in the same league as our Toledo Mud Hens. In fact they were the Mud Hens' opponent the  night of the WJZE/Bullseye Blues/CityPaper game that the Root Hoot sponsored. From Columbus we calculated about a six hour drive to the West Virginia/Virginia border, where the Pulaski Rangers, Bluefield Orioles and the Princeton Devil Rays would all be home on the Friday or Saturday of our planned trip. These teams are all in the Appalachian League, which is a A, or actually a Rookie, league. This is pretty much the first level for aspiring high school or college kids to play professional ball. From there we needed to plan a Sunday game that would allow us to get back to Toledo before dawn on Monday, but hopefully about six hours sooner. Both Akron and Canton, Ohio have teams: the Akron Aeros are the AA affiliate of the Cleveland Indians and the Canton Crocodiles are in an independent league, that is none of the teams are tied in with a major league club. We figured these guys would be somewhere between the youngest and least experienced and the wily old veterans still trying to make it to The Show. We concluded the Crocodiles would offer the unadoed baseball and wrote the 5:00 Sunday game on our itinerary.   The trip went like this:

	Thursday: Columbus Clippers vs. Charlotte Knights Friday: Morning in Athens, Ohio and the drive through West Virginia  Our visit with Nat Reese Ball game in Pulaski, Va Saturday:   Drive through West-By God-Virginia  The John Henry Festival in Talcott, West Virginia Ball Ballgame in Bluefield, West Virginia Sunday: Heading back north through southeastern Ohio  Ball game in Canton, Ohio.

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