All American: The Power of Sports
#ArchivesSports memorabilia is prevalent among the items in the Plano Public Library Archives. The collection has a baseball cap, letter patches and a 1934 Plano High School Letter Sweater with a bi-district champion patch. Notice the size of the sweater compared to librarian Tre. A Plano Senior High football player of today is unlikely to fit its small size!
Other sport memorabilia are available online at Collin County Images. The archives house items such as football programs, yearbooks, pictures of teams, football banquets and other celebrations, stories and souvenirs. Besides football, our archives collections include other sports such as baseball, basketball, tennis and soccer.
Baseball
In 1898, Plano baseball enthusiasts wanted to create a team to beat Wylie and were willing to import players to do so. Fortunately, two players from Kansas, a pitcher and catcher, happened to come to Plano to organize a team. After meeting T.O. Ray and C.E. Hood from Plano, who became the team managers, three other players were gathered from Kansas – Morgan, a pitcher; Loose, second baseman; and Hester, center fielder. Along with F.T.N. Hood and R.B. Howey, a team was formed, a field was built, and Plano beat the Wylie Shamrocks.
They went on to play teams such as the Texas League Panthers of Fort Worth and the Galveston Sand Crabs, but did not finish the three games scheduled against Galveston because the “Spanish American War was in progress.” Although the names on the Plano Baseball Team picture have faded, the following can be made out – First row: John Bra___, Moore, Morgan, Switzer, Du___; Second row: Chas. Hood, R.B. Howey, T.O. Ray, W.M. Chaddick, ______, ________, Hester.
Basketball
Women have also represented Plano in sports for over 100 years. This picture shows the first Plano High School Girls Basketball Team of 1914.
The outfits the girls are wearing were their uniforms at the time – imagine trying to play in pants like that!
Names were given on the back of the image, but it was not explained who was who in the picture: Miss Higginbotham, Coach; Ura Anderson, Mary Herring, Goldie Beverly, Lura Mae Aldridge, Jessie Robbins, Hester Henry, Bertha Lewis and Nina McCormick.
Use the #ArchivesHashtagParty tag to see Genealogy Center staff dive into the archives to explore topics such as postcards, trees and signatures.
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