Archive for the ‘21st Century Baseball History’ Category

E.C. Voltz is listed as the umpire in three games in the National Association in 1871 (8/30) and 1872 (6/15 and 6/22) - all played in Cleveland.

Retrosheet.org lists him as Earnest C. Voltz, born 11/13/1848. He was a medial student at the time (1868-1872) at Western Reserve Medical College in Cleveland.

More likely, perhaps, E.C. Voltz was Edward Charles Voltz born in 1845 in Ohio. He was a well-known stage manager and actor at Cleveland’s Opera House. 

Edward had umpired many baseball games in the Cleveland area, even prior to the National Association’s creation – as described on page 38 of James Egan’s Baseball on the Western Reserve in a game recap from 7/8/1869. Edward is also listed in the Cleveland Plain Dealer on 7/23/1869: “Umpire – Mr. Ed. Voltz, of the “Ours” club, of Philadelphia.”

Egan lists and “E.C. Voltz” from “Ours” club as umpire in a 6/29/1869 game on pp. 34-35. NOTE: The Ours club stemmed from Philadelphia, Ohio, located about 70 miles from Cleveland.

Further, E.C. Voltz is listed as a scorer for a game between newspapermen on 9/23/1867 in the Plain Dealer. Earnest would have been only 18 years old at the time. He umpired another writers game in the 8/10/1868 issue of the Plain Dealer.

Edward died 12/2/1875 in Cleveland.

A couple of baseball history bad raps have been dished out on the TV series Law & Order and its off-shoots.

First, the District Attorney played by Fred Thompson stated that Bob Gibson was well known to doctor the ball. The writers must have confused Gibson with Whitey Ford or others of the same era.

Second, on Law & Order Criminal Intent, Vincent D’Onofrio mentioned that he saw Willie Mays one time and he seemed to be a pretty unhappy guy. Seems Mays was also being confused with other men in baseball history who were more politically active on the race issue – like Hank Aaron or Frank Robinson.