The Forest Citys were a short lived professional baseball team based in Cleveland in the early 1870s. The actual name of the team, as shown in standings, was Forest City, not "Cleveland". The name "Forest Citys" was used in the same generic style of the day in which the team from Chicago was called the "Chicagos". Modern writers often refer to the club as the "Cleveland Forest Citys", which does not reflect 1870s usage, but does distinguish the team from the Rockford, Illinois, professional team that was also called "Forest City". Professional baseball began in Cleveland in 1869, following the lead of the first openly professional team, the

Cincinnati Red Stockings The Cincinnati Red Stockings of were baseball's first all-professional team, with ten salaried players. The Cincinnati Base Ball Club formed in 1866 and fielded competitive teams in the National Association of Base Ball Players (NABBP) 1867– ...

, on the other side of Ohio. The Forest City club was the first fully salaried Cleveland team, beginning in 1870 as an independent. The club played against amateur, semipro, and professional teams, including the racially integrated Resolutes Club from Oberlin College.Morris, Peter. A Game of Inches: The Stories Behind the Innovations That Shaped Baseball: The Game on the Field. Rowman & Littlefield, 2006. p506 In

1871 Events January–March * January 3 – Franco-Prussian War – Battle of Bapaume: Prussians win a strategic victory. * January 18 – Proclamation of the German Empire: The member states of the North German Confederation and the sout ...

the Forest Citys joined the first professional league, the National Association. The Forest Citys' home games were played at the

National Association Grounds National Association Grounds was a baseball grounds in Cleveland, Ohio, located at Central Avenue and East 55th Street. It was home to the Cleveland Forest Citys of the National Association in 1871 and 1872, with Cleveland winning five of its sixte ...

in Cleveland. Forest City played in the first National Association game, as the visiting team against the

Kekionga Kekionga (meaning "blackberry bush"), also known as KiskakonCharles R. Poinsatte, ''Fort Wayne During the Canal Era 1828-1855,'' Indianapolis: Indiana Historical Bureau, 1969, p. 1 or Pacan's Village, was the capital of the Miami tribe. It was l ...

club of

Fort Wayne, Indiana Fort Wayne is a city in and the county seat of Allen County, Indiana, United States. Located in northeastern Indiana, the city is west of the Ohio border and south of the Michigan border. The city's population was 263,886 as of the 2020 Censu ...

. They were shut out by a score of 0-2. The Forest City club's record over its two seasons was poor, winning 16 and losing 35. The small quantity of games was typical in the early years, when teams often played only once a week. The team folded after the

1872 Events January–March * January 12 – Yohannes IV is crowned Emperor of Ethiopia in Axum, the first ruler crowned in that city in over 500 years. * February 2 – The government of the United Kingdom buys a number of forts on ...

season.

References

Baseball-Reference.com

See also

References

Further reading