Northwest Arkansas Democrat-Gazette
New softball fields dedicated
Officials christen Fort Smith diamonds with first pitch
FORT SMITH — A formerly weedy patch of ground in an isolated corner of Ben Geren Regional Park was alive Saturday with the happy noise of young girls playing softball and their families cheering them on.
Sebastian County and Fort Smith officials gathered at the park between games for a first-pitch ceremony to christen two new fields that will be the permanent home of the Sebastian County Girls Softball Association.
Throwing out the ceremonial first pitch, County Judge David Hudson underhanded a day- glo green softball to two players, Gabbie Price, 7, of Spiro, Okla., who is on the team Boom, and Onesty Thomas, 7, of Fort Smith, who plays for Lady Logistics. The girls were singled out for making unassisted triple plays in league play in the past year.
“It’s been a long time coming, but we are here today to officially kick these fields into gear,” Fort Smith Mayor Sandy Sanders said during the ceremony.
Association president Mike Bock said the girls have been playing on the fields since the weekend after Labor Day. The 13-team fall league wrapped up its season Saturday.
Onesty has enjoyed playing on the new fields this season, said her mother, Crystal Thomas.
“It’s good for her,” she said. “She gets to meet a lot of new people, a lot of girls. They get to play together. It’s more like a family than a team.”
Coaches focus on instilling a positive attitude in the girls, Bock said. The league, for example, is very free in awarding trophies to the players.
“A trophy to a young kid is like a piece of gold,” Bock said.
Sebastian County invited the 46-team association for girls ages 6-14 to move six years ago to Ben Geren, where they shared fields with the 100-team Ben Geren Softball League. The association will continue to play and practice on two of the Ben Geren fields they have been using, in addition to the two new fields, which will not be used by the Ben Geren league.
The Sebastian County girls league had to vacate the four fields it had used at Andrews Field near downtown Fort Smith in 2008. Fort Smith officials donated that land for an expansion of the Fort Smith National Cemetery, which was running out of space with the passing of veterans of World War II and the Korean War.
The new fields at Ben Geren park fulfill a promise city officials made to replace the fields at Andrews Field, City Administrator Ray Gosack said.
Bock said he and the association board didn’t oppose the taking of Andrews Field, because ensuring that people who served the country had a burial plot at the cemetery was worth the sacrifice.
“We didn’t fight it because it was the right thing to do,” he said.
Hudson said the association was invited to move to Ben Geren because serving girls softball is a high priority for the county and to provide indirect support for the cemetery expansion.
Andrews Field had been the city’s premier sports arena from its construction in 1921 until a tornado took out all but the concrete stands in the 1960s. Four local professional baseball teams used Andrews Field over the years, and several famous major league players from the 1940s and 1950s played on the fields as well.
The Sebastian County Girls Softball Association began playing at Andrews Field in 1974, Bock said, when Claudia Vaughn became the first commissioner of youth softball in Fort Smith, he said. The association named an award in her honor.
The new fields at Ben Geren park were built using mon- ey from a one-eighth percent sales tax that voters approved in 2012. LJB Construction Inc. of Fort Smith was awarded the $1.23 million construction contract in July 2013. Musco Sports Lighting of Oskaloosa, Iowa, was awarded the lighting contract for $126,000.
Sanders said Sykes Enterprises of Fort Smith donated the scoreboards for the fields.
The irrigated fields have outfield fences 225 feet from home plate, making them conform to official girls fast-pitch softball standards, Bock said. The fields also comply with fast-pitch softball standards through the collegiate level and youth baseball through age 12.
Bock said the Northside High School girls softball team is expected to use the fields as their home fields.
The complex also consists of bleachers, a concession stand, restrooms, storage for the association’s use and an expanded parking lot.