Lawrence-Dumont Stadium in Wichita badly needed repairs, and the Wichita Wranglers were struggling with low attendance. Bob Rich Jr., who had owned the team for 18 years, knew he had to make a change.
Rich, majority owner of a large food processing company in Buffalo, N.Y., had long been involved in sports. In 1969, he was an investor in the Buffalo Sabres of the National Hockey League and later became the team's vice chairman. In 1983, his company purchased a minor league basketball team, the Buffalo Bisons.
As the Wichita franchise slowly sank, Rich looked south to booming northwest Arkansas and decided the region could support a professional team. In 2006, he approached business and civic leaders in Arkansas and said he would move the team to Springdale if voters approved a sales tax to raise $50 million for a stadium.
Though the area was thriving, the vote was no slam dunk. Powerful church leaders opposed the tax because alcohol would be served at the stadium. The July 2006 initiative passed narrowly.
The name Naturals was a natural for the club since Arkansas markets itself as the Natural State and since the movie "The Natural" played a role in Rich's success with the Bisons. The Buffalo team suffered low attendance for years, and Rich was able to pick it up for $100,000.
Hollywood producers approached Rich about filming scenes for "The Natural" at the stadium in Buffalo. The success of the Robert Redford film led to interest in the team, and attendance tripled.
In an online fan poll back in Arkansas, 33 percent favored using the name Naturals. The name Thunder Chickens finished second with 25 percent. Rich saw to it that the team used the Thunder Chicken moniker at least once a year to salute Arkansas' poultry industry.
The tax funded construction of Arvest Ballpark, which is visible from what's now Interstate 49. About $33 million went into the stadium while the other $17 million was used for roads and infrastructure improvements in former pastures that are filled these days with medical facilities.
I drive by the Springdale stadium on a rainy May day and think how fortunate Arkansas was that its two professional baseball teams survived a purge by Major League Baseball that eliminated 42 franchises. The state is blessed with two fine stadiums--Arvest and Dickey-Stephens Park in North Little Rock, home of the Arkansas Travelers--as Arkansans' thoughts turn to baseball on these warm late-spring evenings.
The Naturals, who began play in 2008, are the defending champions for what's again known as the Texas League after a year as Double-A Central. The franchise that's now the Naturals began as the Amarillo Gold Sox in 1976 and became the Beaumont Golden Gators in 1983. That was followed by the Wichita Pilots in 1987 and the Wichita Wranglers in 1989. The franchise was a Padres affiliate from 1976-94 and has been a Kansas City Royals affiliate since then.
Back in central Arkansas, the Travelers boast one of the longest histories in professional sports. The team first played in the Southern League in 1895. Other league members were Atlanta, Chattanooga, Memphis, Nashville, New Orleans, Evansville and Montgomery. The Travelers posted a 25-47 record that inaugural season.
After the Southern League folded, professional baseball was absent in Little Rock for five years. The Travelers returned in 1901 with the formation of the Southern Association and finished second, one game behind Nashville. They were second again in 1902.
Enter William Marmaduke Kavanaugh, an Alabama native and son of a minister. Kavanaugh moved to Clarksville following his graduation in 1885 from Kentucky Military Institute. He worked for a bank and merchant there before moving to Little Rock in 1886 to work for the Arkansas Gazette. Kavanaugh was the Gazette's managing editor from 1890-96. After leaving the newspaper business, he was Pulaski County sheriff for four years and Pulaski County judge for another four years.
In 1913, the Arkansas Legislature selected Kavanaugh to finish the term of deceased U.S. Sen. Jeff Davis. Kavanaugh was even a member of the Little Rock School Board for a dozen years. He had been asked to become Southern Association president in 1902. Fellow board members of the National Association of Baseball Clubs referred to him as the "squarest man in baseball."
Poor attendance and financial difficulties caused the Travelers to drop out of the Southern Association as the 1910 season approached, but Kavanaugh continued to serve as league president. He never gave up hope that professional baseball would return to Arkansas' capital city.
Kavanaugh announced the return of the Travelers on Feb. 20, 1915. He died the next day at the age of 48, following what was described as an hour-long attack of acute indigestion.
West End Park, the Travelers' home, was renamed Kavanaugh Field. When the ballpark closed in 1931, the property was sold to Little Rock High School (now Little Rock Central). Quigley-Cox Stadium is now at that location. In 1936, Kavanaugh Boulevard was named in honor of a man some had considered to be Arkansas' foremost citizen.
Kavanaugh didn't live to see the Travelers' first championship, which came in 1920. The team finished the season with an 88-59 record. In their final season at Kavanaugh Field in 1931, the Travelers attracted 113,758 fans, the second-highest attendance since that 1920 title. Land near the Arkansas State Hospital was donated by the city in 1932, and Travelers Field became the team's second home.
The stadium was renamed for longtime general manager Ray Winder in 1966. Winder had started as a ticket taker in 1915 and worked his way up the ladder. During his more than five decades with the team, Winder used extreme tactics from time to time to keep professional baseball in Arkansas.
After attracting fewer than 68,000 fans during a 77-game home schedule in 1958, the Travelers moved to Shreveport for the 1959 season. Just as had been the case with Kavanaugh decades earlier, Winder never lost faith that professional baseball would return. The Little Rock team was back in the Southern Association in 1960 following the purchase of the New Orleans Pelicans.
To buy the Pelicans, Winder formed the Arkansas Travelers Baseball Club Inc. in 1960 and led a public stock drive. Each share of stock was worth $5. All dividends went back to the club.
Little Rock native Bill Valentine, who had worked as an American League umpire from 1963-68, became the Travelers' general manager in 1976. He grew up within walking distance of Travelers Field, where he would sort soft drink bottles before games, shag foul balls during games and retrieve seat cushions after games.
In September 1968, Valentine was informed by Joe Cronin, the American League president, that he had been fired along with umpire Al Salerno. Valentine and Salerno had tried to form a union of American League umpires. Valentine returned to Little Rock, where he worked for the Arkansas Republican Party, did radio and television sportscasts and officiated college basketball games.
In Valentine's first year as general manager, attendance at Traveler games increased 34 percent. Valentine gave away thousands of tickets to children and held events such as midget wrestling to attract fans. He was the team's general manager until 2007 and remained as executive vice president for two more seasons before retiring in March 2009. Valentine died in April 2015 at age 82.
The Travelers hosted their first game at Dickey-Stephens Park on April 12, 2007. Warren Stephens, youngest son of the late financier Jack Stephens, donated land along the Arkansas River for the stadium. North Little Rock voters then approved a temporary sales tax to fund the facility.
Now, professional baseball fans in Arkansas have their choice of two stadiums in which to watch professional baseball. Pioneers like Kavanaugh and Winder would be amazed at how far the state has come.
Rex Nelson is a senior editor at the Arkansas Democrat-Gazette.