Alabama Florida League – Search

The Enterprise Boll Weevels relocated to Graceville in 1952, according to this
web page. Before the start of the 1953 season there was a contest to name the
Graceville team. My brother, Danny Wall, submitted the name, Oilers. He won
a season pass for this winning entry. I was a 11 years old going on 12 and my friends
and I would sit in the trees in centerfield in a tree house some older boys
had built. It was a grand view from there. If we wanted to get in games we
would chase fowl balls and turn them.  That would get us into  the game.
Eventually, I had done this enough times to get noticed and I  became
the visiting team bat boy for a time.
I remember big John Streza: You had
to be careful around him! He was gruff character  and always had a big chew
of tobacco in his mouth.  I was afraid that if Big John sent one big spit
in my direction,  my mother would forbid me from returning  to that
most enjoyable job.  Streza always give me a used ball after the game and
any broken bats. For a time, I had a wide collection of Louisville Slugger Signature
bats  at my house: Mickey Mantle, Yogi Berra, Eddie Matthews, Ralph
Kiner, and others. I would tack and tape them together to make a usuable bat
out of the broken ones. On some, I would saw off the barrel so that I could get
around on quickly on a pitch. After I had  fixed them up,  they were
as good as new as far as a young kis like me was concerned. I remember some bats
were very heavy with thick handles, others had very skinny handles like more
modern bats.  I would work on my hitting from my daddy’s pasture over to
Mixon Cooper’s pasture. Mixon Cooper was one of the founders and the principle
backer of the Graceville team. The decade of the 1950’s was a great time to 
be a boy in Graceville. There were so many  Oilers that were our heroes.
As time has passed,  I’ve forgotten most of their names. The players boarded
with local folks and how we kids envied a neighbor who had a player living
with them. Those Oiler players  were just as important to us as Willie Mays
was to a Giants fan.  Some of the stars that I still remember were guys
like Chuck Quimby. What a great hitter Chuck Quimby was!  Holt Milner was
the manager, and I  have a souvenir bat to this very day.
Al Rivenback
was one of my all time favorites, with a swing reminiscent of Stan the Man
Musial, and Marcus Davis, a big name in the league drew a lot of excitement when
he was sent  to Graceville: It felt sort of  like John Wayne coming
to town to us kids. As I recall, Marcus was a sheriff or held some similar office
in Alabama. He managed and pitched for the Oilers and was one of my favorites.
I was also very fond of Byrd Whigham. He was a very athletic and impressive
young player from Louisville, Alabama. Graceville had some home-grown talent
too, the best known being Charlie Grant, who played for Donaldsonville and then
Graceville. Another local player who became an Oiler was Wilbur « Smiley » Fowler.
Both of these Graceville products made it as high as AAA before falling back
down to the lower leagues. Smiley Fowler became  the head football coach
at Graceville in the 1950’s and he had a number of  very competitive and successful
teams.  Even with the big names of John Streza, Chuck Quimby, Charlie
Grant, and  Neal Cobb, I  thought  Jim Bello was the big gun!
He could hit balls over the tall pine trees on the other side of the left field
fence!  I graduated in 1959 and two of my classmates, Kenneth Davis and
Sonny Balcomb,  are remembered for hitting prodigious home runs in Sportsman’s
Park.  Davis  was  invited to try out for the Graceville
team and did play with the Oilers for a short time. Sonny Balcomb had only one
eye, but has a gifted athlete. He could throw a ball out of Oiler park down the
right field line from home plate. He had the skills but declined opportunities
to go further in sports due to concern over his vision.

Lane Harris –
  former Graceville Oilers batboy