Baseball: America's favorite past time. As I have come to discover with many other different popular events and activities, such as horse racing, aviation, and golf, Long Island has a long and rich history with baseball too. The first all-black professional baseball team, the Athletics of Babylon, called Long Island home in 1885. Also known as the Cuban Giants, the Athletics dominated the league and eventually relocated to Florida. Moreover, in the 19th century Nassau and Suffolk Counties had a combined 400+ baseball clubs.
The Long Island Ducks are a professional baseball team in the Atlantic League of Professional Baseball, which is independent of Major League Baseball. Relatively knew, the Ducks' inaugural season was just 15 years ago in 2000. The Ducks have captured 3 championships in 10 playoff appearances.
In addition to alluding to the infamous baseball snack of Cracker Jacks, giving fans an opportunity to purchase quacker whistles, and having a duck mascot named Quacker Jack, the "Ducks" name has much more significant meaning.
In addition to alluding to the infamous baseball snack of Cracker Jacks, giving fans an opportunity to purchase quacker whistles, and having a duck mascot named Quacker Jack, the "Ducks" name has much more significant meaning.
The "Ducks" name refers to Long Island's long established duck-farming heritage. Duck farming on Long Island dates back, again, to the late 1800s when the first ducks for breeding arrived from China. Duck became the primary and favorite source of poultry on Long Island in the 1900s; by the 1960s, LI farms were producing over 7.5 million ducks annually! Unfortunately, due to a variety of reasons, only there is only one reported duck farm remaining today (producing over 1 million ducks a year).
The Big Duck, a 20 foot tall concrete structure built in 1931, pays tribute to duck farming history. Surprisingly claimed to be Long Island's most famous land mark, the Big Duck is on the National Register of Historic Places.
The Big Duck, a 20 foot tall concrete structure built in 1931, pays tribute to duck farming history. Surprisingly claimed to be Long Island's most famous land mark, the Big Duck is on the National Register of Historic Places.
For an independent league team, I was extremely surprised how nice Bethpage Ballpark was as well as how many fans were in attendance. The stadium was as nice as many college and minor league team stadiums.