10/28/2026
The South Ridge baseball team formed in 1939 when kids from two country schools, Nerison and Brown, decided to join forces. When they started out, they were mostly 12 and 13 year olds, had no uniforms or spiked shoes, and only had two balls to practice and play with. They faced their share of challenges in the first few years, only winning a handful of games and being the only team in the league to wear bib overalls and farm shoes to play. Art Thiege, the South Ridge catcher, recalled how his mother used to pad his glove with beefsteak wrapped in cloth, so catching the ball didn't hurt as much!
Despite their humble beginnings, the team grew quickly. Eight years after its founding, in 1947, the South Ridge baseball team won the Vernon County League Championship with 17 straight victories! In 1948, the team raised $8000 to install lights in Esofea Park, where they practiced, making the park the first lighted ball field in all of Vernon County.
Hopefully some of you in the C**n Valley/Esofea area can give the Brewers some of your Championship luck tonight!
(Photo and info from an article written by Dorothy Jasperson, published in the Westby Times, 11-2-2000. If you want to learn more about the South Ridge baseball team, we have a lot more where this came from in our archives, including an entire book on the team, written by Jean Thiege Marck.)
