The Tecumsehs of the International Association: Canada’s First Major League Baseball Champions

Baseball has been an “international” game for a long, long time. The Blue Jays can’t take credit for that.

This narrative marks the first comprehensive telling of the story of the acclaimed London Tecumsehs team of the 1870s. References to the team often crop up in baseball histories and newspaper accounts of their day.

The well-financed Tecumsehs attracted some top talent from south of the border, among them early curveball pitcher Fred Goldsmith, outfielder Joe “Dutch” Hornung, catcher Phil Powers and infielder and famed slugger Ross Barnes. The Tecumsehs played exhibition games against some of the top National League clubs of its day and defeated several of them, including Spalding’s Chicago White Stockings.

  • London regularly played throughout the U.S. northeast, making a name for itself as a top baseball city at a pivotal time in baseball history.

    This story about the Tecumsehs is also about the International Association, about which little is known and confusion exists. On a visit to the National Baseball Hall of Fame Library, the author found very little about the Association and was dismayed to see that its rather slender file included much material about the later, but unrelated, International League, a minor loop. The Library staff was unaware of the difference or the years that the Association existed.

London Advertiser, August 1876

Labatt Memorial Park. Originally named Tecumseh Park, home of the London Tecumsehs.

 REVIEWS

“Engrossing and meticulously researched…. Martin has crafted another must-read for Canadian baseball and sports fans.”
—Kevin Glew for the Canadian Baseball Network;

“There’s no denying [Martin’s] double play prowess consisting of deft research and writing skills, twinned with a strong knowledge of and passion for the diamond game…. The Tecumsehs of the International Association: Canada’s First Major League Baseball Champions is a winner”
—Jeffrey Reed, London Ontario Sports.com;

“Brian Martin makes a convincing case that the Tecumsehs of London have been unfairly neglected and that they deserve to be recognized, not just as a pioneer Canadian club, but as one of the champion clubs of the early years of baseball.”
—Peter Morris, author of A Game of Inches.

BACK TO BOOKS