WEB SITE CREATED
BY SCOTT PARKS
Deep South Baseball Reunions
Baseball Reunions, players getting together to relive their baseball pasts, have been going on for some time now, but a very special reunion occured in 1999: Marvin Walker of Andalusia and Glenn Perdue of Montgomery, got together to organize a reunion of former Alabama-Florida League players. With only a couple weeks notice, they gathered a group of former AFL players to swap stories over lunch. Perdue asked Montgomery's WSFA sports director, Phil Snow, to mention the reunion on his 6:00 sportscast. I happened to be watching that night and wrote down the phone numbers WSFA put on the screen. I was excited that I had found people tied to the league I had become interested in. While I was unable to attend, I contacted Perdue and Walker and met with both of them. It was after those meetings that this web page began to grow into something more that a weekend experiment in HTML.
There was only one more AFL reunion: the 2000 meeting in Andalusia. Then in 2001, Moultrie Georgia native, Clint Chafin, decided to organize a reunion of players from Georgia minor league and semi-pro baseball. Chafin, son of minor leaguer Bobbie H. Chafin, wanted to honor his father's memory by bringing former ballplayers together. With the invaluable help of the Museum of Colquitt County History, Clint's hard work paid off in a small but well-received reunion in Moultrie. The reunion was so much fun that Clint decided to try and make the it an annual event. The 2002 reunion was bigger, with more players coming and a bigger venue for them to meet in. Then in August of 2003, a new reunion brought together not only Georgia minor league players and fans, but Alabama-Florida League players and fans. I attended and met Clint and John Bell, two guys I had corresponded with for quite some time. We displayed memorabilia, met many friends of this web page, and had a wonderful time meeting the players. Clint, John, and the Colquitt County museum staff deserve high praise for their efforts.
It was apparent that we had a good thing going and we set our sites on a bigger and better reunion for 2004. This time, we brought Atlanta sports journalist, Furman Bisher, and the author of Long Gone, Paul Hemphill, as our special guests. More players than ever attended, as did a group of enthusiastic baseball fans and a representative of Minor League Baseball.
You can review the various reunions through this index. Better yet, why not attend the next one!.
