Teams

The 1940 Old Hickory Du Pont company baseball team poses for picture. The Jerry Barnes Collection. Courtesy of Jerry Barnes.

A ca. 1930s-1940s Old Hickory Du Pont company baseball team poses for a picture. The Jerry Barnes Collection. Courtesy of Jerry Barnes.

A ca. 1930s-1940s Old Hickory Du Pont company baseball team poses for a picture before leaving on a trip to watch the World Series. The Jerry Barnes Collection. Courtesy of Jerry Barnes.

A ca. 1920s Old Hickory Du Pont company baseball team posing for a picture. The Jerry Barnes Collection. Courtesy of Jerry Barnes.

Old Hickory’s DuPont plant once boasted several organized baseball teams in numerous amateur leagues. However, Old Hickory Du Pont teams generally played in one of three leagues: the Plant League, the Saturday League, and the Kay-Tee League.

The Plant League consisted of teams formed by members of the various Old Hickory Du Pont plant departments and shifts. Until World War II, when the war and subsequent military draft made it difficult to form a plant league, as well as softball beginning to surpass baseball in popularity, the Plant League usually had anywhere from eight to ten teams.

The Municipal Baseball Association of Nashville managed and sponsored the Saturday League, which consisted of teams whose members worked at a variety of companies and businesses in the Nashville and Davidson County, Tennessee area, like the Du Pont plant in Old Hickory. [1]

Although research has so far revealed little about the Kay-Tee League, it appears that it consisted of company and business teams from central Tennessee and south-central Kentucky. For example, the 1935 Kay-Tee League consisted of teams from Old Hickory, Nashville, and Gallatin, Tennessee; as well as Franklin and Glasgow, Kentucky. [2]

[1] "Du Pont to Play in Two Leagues," Old Hickory News, April 9, 1936.

[2] "How They Stand," Old Hickory News, August 8, 1935.