Baseball and Buford: The Bona Allen Shoemakers

The following is an excerpt from a blog posted by Rebecca Bradshaw. Bradshaw is a volunteer at the Museum of Buford.

Since it's World Series time of year, I thought I'd write a bit about Buford's own famous baseball team, the Bona Allen Shoemakers, semi-professional baseball World Series winners of 1938. Formed in the early thirties from three separate teams from the tannery, shoe factory and the "town team," the semi-pro Shoemakers were officially formed in 1933, when outside athletes were added, and eventually managers with professional baseball experience were brought in to run the team. Throughout the 1930s until they disbanded with the coming of WWII, the Shoemakers were an outstanding team, with an impressive record of wins. Their most important victories were winning the 1938 Semi-Pro World Series in Wichita, Kansas, and then going on to win what was considered by many as the "toughest of the national tourneys," the Denver Post tournament in 1940.

The Shoemakers couldn't have been more beloved by Buford. They were hometown heroes, with their own private tour bus and ball park. They also brought night games to Buford -- the first in Georgia outside of Atlanta. The team was so popular that when they played away games, crowds would gather at the empty ball park to listen as the Bona Allen office broadcast teletyped play by play over the loudspeakers. 

Read more about the Bona Allen Shoemakers on Buford Patch.