Mankato Free Press · Mankato, Minnesota · 1910

Nowhere under God's blue canopy do the people love their game as we do our baseball

Mayor Meyer opened Mankato's 1910 season with a speech the Free Press printed in full: words fail to express the pleasure which I feel, every nation has its national game, and nowhere under God's blue canopy do the people love their game as we do our baseball.

Before the first pitch of Mankato’s 1910 season, the mayor took the field. “Mayor Meyer delivered this address to the fans at the fair grounds Saturday afternoon, prior to the beginning of the game,” the Free Press reported under the headline “MAYOR ADDRESSES THE FANS,” and then it printed the whole thing.

The speech is civic oratory in its Sunday clothes. “Ladies and Gentlemen: Words fail to express the pleasure which I feel at being called upon to open the baseball season of 1910 for Mankato.” Then the big swing: “Every nation has its national game, but nowhere under God’s blue canopy do the people love their game as we do our baseball.” He credits last year’s management for placing Mankato “among the leaders of our state in baseball” and builds toward his charge to the crowd: “Now, ladies and gentlemen, the success of our boys this year depends entirely upon ourselves. If we wish”

And there the page ends. Not the speech, the page. The bottom edge of the paper is torn away in the scan, and a century of storage has left His Honor forever mid-flourish, wishing. Whatever Mankato was supposed to do, we have to assume they did it, because the man had the crowd right where he wanted them.