There was a lot of excitement in August 1928 when the Ridgeway baseball team played against the world champion Kansas City Monarchs, described as the “fastest colored baseball team in the baseball world”. An article the Ridgeway Journal on the day of the game (August 9, 1928) listed each member of the KC Monarchs team and and informed readers that “Truly, no matter how many big league games you have seen, you have never seen anything in baseball if you haven’t seen the Monarchs play”. Ridgeway was expected to give them a good game and had recruited retired Pittsburgh Pirates pitcher Babe Adams to play. He was living in Mt. Moriah at the time and was also running for county sheriff. The game was played on the Ridgeway field, local businesses all closed for the event and there were “seats for a thousand people.” It was expected that the local boys would beat the visiting team, or at least come close.
Despite the local hopes, the Monarchs beat Ridgeway soundly 12-1. (Ridgeway Journal, Aug 16, 1928) Ridgeway got their only run in the first inning, but they fought hard and were able to keep the Monarchs from scoring for three innings. The sports writer was still very impressed by the Monarchs and said that “they showed baseball fans of this part of the country how baseball should be played and played correctly.”
