America's Pastime in Woodland Park

By Steve Plutt, © August 12, 2025

Since the American Civil War, baseball has been described across this nation as "America's Pastime." In Colorado, the first recorded game goes back to 1862. Here in Woodland Park, the diamond sport goes back at least 125 years and has a cultural and historical significance here.

Back in 1891, as shown in the map below, Daniel Steffa and John Anisfield platted out and filed with the El Paso County Clerk, the “Highlands Addition” to the newly incorporated town of Woodland Park.  Included in this filing was an entire block for the future Woodland Hotel, which was built by Anisfield in 1891. Across the street from the hotel, between Browning and Lafayette Avenue, at Burdette Street, the land was reserved for an athletic field. So, this land would have been the beginning of baseball in Woodland Park.

Also note the Colorado Midland railroad “Y;” the hotel was built intentionally at the spot above to utilize the Y. Passengers and baggage would leave the train and hop on a carriage for the remaining distance to the hotel.

But documented baseball here was first reported in 1901. As the Gazette article below reports, Woodland Park organized an athletic association in the spring of 1901.

As shown above, the diamond was located at the corner of Burdette Street, in between Lorraine and Browning.  Many Pikes Peak Region teams, such as the “South Conejos Street Sluggers”, the “Coal Pickers” and the “Cascade Sluggers” took the Colorado Midland train up Ute Pass to play here.

Tournaments were also held here, with the Semi-professional Colorado Springs “Millionaires” of the Western League hosting teams from the Midwest. Teams from places such as  Kansas City, Des Moines, Omaha and other teams in the Western League would travel to Woodland Park and play here.  [For more information on this, see David Raith's article "When Professional Baseball came to Woodland Park and Cripple Creek"]

Besides its beautiful scenery, perhaps the reason that Woodland Park was such a popular place to play was that numerous baseball teams in the U.S. were forbidden to play ball on Sunday.

Denver, for example could not play on Sundays and scheduled those games in Woodland Park.  Also, the Colorado Springs Weekly Gazette reported in 1901 that Sunday baseball games would be played in Woodland Park. 

Hosting these baseball games was apparently a coveted position. This is evidenced by a news story in the Colorado Springs Gazette that the Cripple Creek-Victor district was miffed that their area at Cameron was overlooked in favor of Woodland Park.   Also, this story that appeared in the Victor Record where the paper is pretty critical of Woodland Park and its playing field, all in order to get the games moved up to the district.

And Victor was justified in their negative comments. After that very first Sunday game, our field had to have a lot of improvements done to it, lest the League did move to the CC-V District. 

During that first game, the shortness of the ballpark, particularly the left field fence, produced a lot of scoring by both teams. The league dictated that this had to be remedied at once.  So that next day, laborers were at the field, moving the fence back another 75 feet. The field was also unlevel so a large force of 30 to 40 men with teams went to work plowing up the fields and leveling it. And yet another crew of workers started the construction of additional grandstands as the crowds were so great, more seating was required.  These improvements kept Victor from getting the games moved to their region.

Besides the economic benefit to the businesses of Woodland Park for these baseball games, the Colorado Midland Railroad was also a very enthusiastic promoter of the games. They would transport hundreds of spectators up Ute Pass to Woodland Park every Sunday, at 50 cents per person. 

Well, despite its nitpickers, baseball in Woodland Park continued and had strong support. The games stayed in town and no one was ever successful in getting them moved from here. Woodland Park baseball continued into the 1920s and 30’s and beyond. And typical for Woodland Park, this article below tells of the Red Sox beating our team in a June, 1922 snowstorm! 

The Woodland Hotel was abandoned and then razed in the late 30s which ended the baseball days there.

But by the 1940s, a new ball field had been built in the center of town. To be exact, right where City Hall is today. 

Below is a circa 1942 photo of our Woodland Park team.  It was included in a 1978 Ute Pass Courier article highlighting Fred “Slick” Hohenstein, by Teri Goebel.

I knew Slick well, he was an everyday Woodland Park character that lived in an old house where AJ’s Pizza is located today.  He was an old semi-pro ball player on teams from Nebraska and Iowa, but played in North and South Dakota as well.  His position was pitcher, earning $129 a month while on the Omaha team. 

He began his baseball career while stationed at Camp Pike, Arkansas.  After his discharge in 1919 he started his minor league career which lasted until he moved to Woodland Park in the early 1940s.

In Woodland Park, most everyday Slick would walk into town to the post office, which was then located on Main Street. As a young teenager, I was always interested in listening to Slick and his stories. And since I’ve always been a baseball fan, I particularly enjoyed those accounts.

He would tell of his days with the Woodland Park team where he was also a pitcher but played first base too. He liked to talk about playing Cripple Creek, Calhan, Rush and other Colorado Springs area teams.  Sundays were the “big games” he recalled.  And they were always played in Woodland Park at the ballpark by what is today City Hall.  The admission was 25 cents and kids got in for free and the games were very popular with excellent attendance. His baseball nickname was “Shotgun.”

In the 1960s baseball in Woodland Park is what I personally remember. That first year that we went to the “new” school, over on Rampart, Eric Dickson would drive three or four of us kids over to the ball diamond in the back of his pickup truck where we would shag errant balls for the “big kids” while they practiced there.

The photo above shows our old ballfield, just west of where the tennis courts used to be.

In this picture, behind the International Scout, you can see the old historic 1891 Woodland Park Calaboose, that served as the town jail. The two-story white house in the back left is on the corner of Henrietta and Pine Street, where Vahsholtz Automotive is today.

On the very right, that building is the old fire house and the building behind the jail is the old Baptist Church and is still some sort of church today, but with additions built on to it.

I have many fond memories of playing ball at this site. When I was in my early teen years, I played Little League baseball for the Baptist Church team. My brother Stan and his best friend, Terry Regester, also played on the Baptist team with me. We played lots of ball games on this field and would go on road trips too, like to the Gold Bowl up in Victor. That ballfield is on the National Register of Historic Places today and it's kind of neat to think that my buddies and I used to play there.

Even though baseball was very popular in town, there just wasn’t a good ball field with nice manicured grass, dugouts and fences. But nevertheless, interest in organized ball continued. In June of 1968, the rosters of six teams of the inaugural Woodland Park Summer Baseball Program were announced.

And from 1979 to 1985 there were two ball diamonds on the corner of Kelley's Road and Rampart Range Road. That land belonged to Ric Hermann who was so very generous letting the Woodland Park Youth Activities Association teams play ball there.

Around the same time, the Catholic Church had a really nice ball diamond located where their newer church is today.

A modern baseball field in Woodland Park was unheard of until early in 1984 when the city bought a 20-acre piece of ground through a lease purchase agreement with Park State Bank. This ground was located near the site of the old town dump, to the west of the Northwoods Subdivision and was christened “Meadow Wood Park.”

Three fields were planned for T-ball, softball and baseball with the potential to serve over 1000 participants and spectators. Construction began on May 11, 1984 when the first shovel full of dirt was turned. The city’s brand new Park and Recreation Director Sally Riley was the driving force of this new complex. The Unofficial Grand Opening of Meadowood happened on September 20, 1986 when Mayor John Carr threw out the first ball. Eight teams that day competed for the Second Annual Dave Reynolds Softball Tournament title and trophy. And for the curious, it was Joe Fry and his Pacesetter Homes that took that honor. 

The “Real and Official” grand opening waited until the spring of 1987.

The baseball tradition in Woodland Park also lives on with the Panther baseball team.

Both of my children, Jim and Jen, made the varsity team in their freshman year and both of them lettered with the team each year of high school.

Baseball has woven itself into Woodland Park’s history going back to the late 19th century. It is a cherished tradition that cultivates a sense of continuity and connection between all age groups of our town and holds a special place in the hearts of many of our citizens.

Our small-town ballparks have always entertained many, with Saturday doubleheaders, hot dogs and peanuts.

It is a source of community pride that brings families and communities together and will endure for generations to come.

So that’s it! And to the best of my knowledge, this is the history of baseball in Woodland Park!

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