![]() Monday mornings, when we have to go back to work, I'll get calls from guys saying they phoned in sick. ![]() "And every year, we pay a price with sore muscles. And, the last few years, we go into the bar on the corner, Bob Cummings' Place, after the games are over. "We tell the same stories every year, but the laughs are bigger. "I guess it's a little bit about holding onto childhood," Steibe says. The first time the neighborhood guys came back to play, they found an old neighborhood street sweeper and had him toss out a ceremonial first pitch. The corner house behind home plate used to be home to the Preller family - thus, the little curb ball area has been dubbed Preller Memorial Field. All the games were competitive and each game was delayed by the locals - braking bikes in the middle of the field, lighting firecrackers, and shouting obscenities about the pink shirt being worn by Wally Piccinnini." For the first time, during play, beer was taken into the field. Just when you think the game has reached its highest level, a new chapter is written. Rowe Price but saves his passion (and his sense of humor) for the old games, and the old gang, points out in his annual Report on the USCBL (United States Curb Ball League, which consists entirely of this annual game): Steibe, who works as a computer operator for T. About half the guys still live in the old neighborhood - and about half have moved to suburbia. In fact, they'll gather tomorrow evening, down at the old East Baltimore curb at Robinson and Pratt, for the annual competition. Steibe's gang has been gathering once a summer for the past decade now. ![]() Police have said, "Why don't you go play over at the park?" The police are told, "There's no curbs there." ![]() Patterson Park's just a few blocks from the curb ball site. When we go back to the old neighborhood to play, they don't know what to make of us."Įven the modern police don't seem to understand. "My older brothers learned it from older guys, and they passed it on to me. "Nobody passed on the game to this generation," Steibe says. ![]()
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