Retracing our route back west from Fargo to Bismarck, we stopped at Jamestown, N.D., famous as the birthplace of Louis L’Amour and Peggy Lee and as the home of the World’s Largest Buffalo. Years ago, it was also a hotbed of baseball. Visit Pitch Black Baseball and click the “North Dakota baseball history” link to learn about integrated baseball in the area in the 1930s, pitching appearances there by Satchel Paige, and the rivalry between Jamestown and Bismarck. It’s great baseball history. Historic Jack Brown Stadium still stands at 1102 3rd Avenue SE in Jamestown, N.D.

We’ve had quite an evening of baseball. Driving into Great Falls, Mont., we switched to over-the-air radio and quickly picked up the broadcast of the Great Falls game (Pioneer League) on KMON-AM 560. We arrived at the historic Great Falls ballpark just in time to see the home team White Sox rally for a dramatic, ninth-inning, come-from-behind 9-8 victory. Chris Carter’s three-run, two-out homer capped a five-run outburst against the Missoula Osprey before 3,315 fans at Centene Stadium for the Sox and new manager Bobby Tolan.

Centene Stadium, formerly known as Legion Park, was originally built in 1940. Renovations give the place something of a split personality. The left-field side includes modern construction while the stands from home plate around to right field offer all the history and

architecture of the original park. Ballpark Digest offers an intelligent description of the park, its history, and preservation efforts that have modernized the facility without sacrificing it for a brand new ballpark. For more details, click on this Centene Stadium link.

From Centene Stadium we drove over to the Motel 6 in time to catch the end of the second game of the College World Series. North Carolina had an early lead, but Oregon State rallied for an 11-7 win to force a winner-take-all third game tomorrow.

Great Falls’ parent club was almost as dramatically successful as its rookie league affiliate. In the national Major League Baseball telecast on ESPN, the Chicago White Sox rallied from a 9-1 deficit against the Houston Astros in the late going. Tad Iguchi hit a three-run homer in the eighth and then belted a grand slam in the ninth off Brad Lidge to tie the game in Chicago. Lidge preserved the tie and Houston prevailed with a run in the 13th for a 10-9 victory in a battle of 2005 league champions. The game ended well past midnight in the east and we would have missed the late-inning excitement back home.

In other local area baseball action, the Lewistown Redbirds defeated the Jackson (Wyoming) Giants in the championship game of the 19th annual Harold Gjerde Legion baseball tournament. The Great Falls Black Sox secured third place at the first Deer Lodge Wranglers Wooden Bat Tournament with an 8-7 win against Bozeman Babe Ruth. The Missoula Mavericks beat the Great Falls Electrics, 16-9, in a Western AA game at Missoula.

We’ve driven about 900 miles in the past two days with stops at Helena, Pasco and Portland.

A final word about Great Falls before moving on west. Right down the street from the home of the rookie league White Sox is a wonderful Lewis and Clark Interpretive Center. Of the many such centers we have visited on the trip, it ranks first with a great location above the Missouri River, a theater that empties into a well designed presentation about the entire Lewis and Clark trip, a walking path that allows visitors a closer look at the river and a well stocked gift shop. The entire center is of museum quality and also features excellent use of sound including an audio tour of the exhibit.

Like Great Falls, Helena also has an historic ballpark. It’s not too far from Montana’s state capitol building. Kindrick Field is the oldest in the Pioneer League, dating back to 1939, the same year the League began play. It’s also the smallest park in the league with a seating capacity of 1,700, but it makes up in character and history what it lacks in size and modern amenities.

Dust Devils Stadium, home of the Tri-City Dust Devils, is much the opposite of Kindrick Field. It opened in 1995 and is the second newest park in the Northwest League. Unlike the urban location of Kindrick Field, Dust Devils Stadium is suburban all the way with a site designed to attract fans from the cities of Pasco, Kennewick and Richland. The location is defined by gas stations, lodging, and “big box” stores like Wal-Mart. But, Tri-City has a solid baseball history including NWL championships in 1966, 1968, 1971 and 1984. The current Tri-City team began play in 2001 as an affiliate of the Colorado Rockies and is in its second year under principal owner George Brett.

Our journey west continued with memorable drives in Idaho on the Lolo Trail and in Washington/Oregon along the Columbia River. We arrived in Portland for the game between the Portland Beavers and the Tucson Sidewinders at PGE Park, the oldest ballpark in Triple-A baseball.

PGE Park dates back to 1926 and has some of the most and least desirable qualities of a vintage park. PGE looks historic and it is nestled into an urban neighborhood. The inside of the park, also used for professional soccer, has a certain Olympic Stadium quality without the full roof. Its roots as a football stadium are clearly apparent. The seating area is in a “J” shape with a straight line of seats from the right field foul pole down to home plate and then curling around third base. The place seems huge with its plentiful foul territory, the party deck past the first base dugout, the high wooden ceiling that cover the seats, and the four levels of new luxury seats behind home plate.

Following the game, a Beavers victory, we walked down the street to Powell’s Books, a Portland landmark and one of the best bookstore’s we’ve visited. Had Lewis and Clark visited Portland, they might have just stayed there and never gotten to the Pacific Ocean. To stay on schedule, we had to forego further exploration of Portland. Had time permitted, we would have visited the other sites noted in Roadside Baseball, the Oregon Sports Hall of Fame, Sckavone Stadium, and the former site of Vaughn Street Ballpark. Instead, we continued west toward a couple last Lewis and Clark sites the following morning.

“Oh Boy, the Ocean’s in view.” That was the feeling when we finally worked our way the last 100 miles northwest from Portland to the end of the outbound portion of the Lewis and Clark trail. We worked somewhat backward from Meriwether and William by visiting interpretive centers first at Fort Clatsop and then at Cape Disappointment. Fort Clatsop is where the Corps of Discovery hunkered down for the winter before the return trip back east. A new replica of the Fort is currently under construction after its predecessor burned down last year.

Cape Disappointment in Ilwaco, Wash., is also undergoing changes. Its interpretive display was recently modernized and ranks with the center at Great Falls as one of the best on the trail. From the interpretive center we drove down to the beach and walked to the Pacific Ocean. We were tired, but pleased that the outbound journey had been successfully accomplished. Of course, that’s only half the battle. And, the journey would not have been made at all except for our next stop, the 36th annual SABR National Convention up the road in Seattle. Our first glimpse of the Seattle skyline came a few miles outside the city. We expected the Space Needle to dominate the view, but it appeared tiny off to the side of the more modern buildings that represent Seattle’s recent growth spurt.

The SABR convention is a highlight of the annual baseball schedule. You can be immersed in a variety of neat and enjoyable baseball activities from the beginning of the convention to the end without ever going outside the hotel, but you would miss out on exploring whatever great city is hosting the event. Decisions must be made and the only reassuring note is that whatever choice you make should result in a memorable experience.

On Thursday afternoon, we chose to get out and see two of Seattle’s signature attractions, the Experience Music Project and the Science Fiction Museum and Hall of Fame. They are both in the same Frank Gehry-designed building. Our transportation of choice was the Seattle Center Monorail, but it is down for repair. Our second choice was foot power and a walk down Fifth Avenue to the Seattle Center area at the northwest end of downtown Seattle that includes the Space Needle, a children’s museum, science center and the music and science-fiction destinations. Later, we saw some of historic Pioneer Square in visiting two social events on the SABR convention schedule at Ebbets Field Flannels and another fine book store, The Elliott Bay Book Company.

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