The Thames Base Ball Club is a non-profit vintage base ball team. Our goal is to promote and preserve the game of base ball as it was play in the mid-19th century and have fun while doing so. During our games we are available to answer any questions from the fans about the differences between the game we as we play it and the modern game of baseball. Some of us are members of the Society for American Baseball Research (SABR).

We play most of our games by the rules of 1861 but often play by 1864 rules and occasionally by 1865 rules. We are a full member of the Vintage Base Ball Association. Most of our opponents are other Connecticut-based teams but we also regularly play a team from Rhode Island as well as an occasional game against teams from Long Island, NY and Massachusetts. We aren’t part of a formal league, but all of the Connecticut teams work together as the Connecticut Vintage Base Ball Association to promote the game and ensure the success of the other teams.

We’re always on the look-out for events that we can play at. If you would like us to play at your event and you have a big-enough field just send us an email at thamesbbc@gmail.com and let us know the date of the event and whether you can put together a team to serve as our opponent or if you would rather that we try to find another vintage team to play.

Our team was formed in 2005, two years after the Mystic Oceanics folded. Edward Baker, who at that time had just become the Executive Director of the New London County Historical Society and was a former member of the Oceanics, decided to form a new team that would be sponsored by the NLCHS. He considered naming the team after the Pequots, a team that played in New London in the late 1860s, but settled on Thames Base Ball Club instead.

Edward Baker in Memoriam (1949-2017)

America’s game, played by 1861 rules, at Fort Trumbull State Park (The Day – May 16, 2015)

Of Strikers and Hands, A Bunch of Cranks, and a Good Bit of Hearty Hollering… (Ink Magazine – July 2015)