The Dirty Water event at the West Hartford Public Library went great. I was very impressed with the crowd--over 100 people. Standing room only for our talk/reading/Q&A. And it seems every single one bought a book or two. We met lots of really nice people. Thanks for coming out, everybody.

Beforehand, I went to the sites of two old Hartford baseball stadiums. Above is the plaque at the site of Bulkeley Stadium, a minor league park.

Here's a close-up. The site is now a private nursing home/housing community. There's really not much to see other than this plaque.

But now for the main attraction:

That's the Church of the Good Shepard. In front of it is a big grass field--site of the old Hartford Ball Club Grounds, home of the Dark Blues, a National League team back in 1876.

I was surprised to see a plaque there--turns out it was placed only three months ago by "Baseball History Alive." In fact, their site has a much better photo gallery than this one. (They did have better weather, though.) (And their site, as well as the plaque, calls it the "Hartford Base Ball Grounds," as opposed to "Ball Club Grounds.")

The church is along the third base side, and this building is out beyond left field, and actually wasn't built yet when the park was standing. The church was built by Sam Colt's wife, and later she added the above building as a memorial to one of their sons.

My car at the "old" corner of Wyllys and Hendricxsen. (Behind home plate.)

Here's a great article about the old Hartford franchise.

And here's more on Elizabeth Hart Colt.

I'm not a big fan of guns or religion, but that doesn't mean their histories don't intrigue me (especially when it involves baseball fields).