Nostalgia Is Rich as a New Baseball Season Is Upon Us
Hope springs eternal
My dad’s mom was a Derringer, making dad a second cousin to Paul Derringer. He’s our family’s one claim to fame. And the reason we’re such big baseball fans, and more specifically Cincinnati Reds fans.
My parents got married in 1975, so they have great memories of the Big Red Machine. I was 10 years old when the Reds Swept the Oakland A’s in the 1990 World Series. But it’s our connection to Paul Derringer and his career with the Reds that anchors our fandom.
Paul spent 10 seasons with the Reds, starting in 1933. He was a St. Louis Cardinal for three seasons before, and a Chicago Cub for three seasons after. My dad’s family had a genealogy book put together, and several artifacts celebrating his playing days were included.
The article below tells of how the great Branch Rickey would come to bird hunt on the Derringer family farm in Washington County, Kentucky. That’s when he discovered Paul, as the general manager of the Cardinals.
Paul went on to pitch the first night game in Major League Baseball history, at Crosley Field in Cincinnati in 1935. He…
