The lovely fruit of the Hedgeapple or Osage Orange (Maclura pomifera) has always been a key product in the local economy. Milfordites have long been known to value the wood for building homes. The fruit of the hedgeapple, while completely inedible, has been a favorite table display since Milford was first settled. It was believed that keeping hedgeapples in a house would lead to an increase in intelligence—quite a factor in a community long plagued by inbreeding.

THE ONCE LOWLY HEDGEAPPLE CHANGED A COMMUNITY AND LATER AN ENTIRE NATION. All that remains from the early days of the sport are old faded photographs. This print from an old tintype (Circa 1855) is believed to be of the Riverside Hedgeapple Stadium on Water Street in old Milford.

Milford usually had a great influx of hedgeapple pickers every fall. Workers migrated from as far away as Goshen and Loveland to stay in the migrant camps and earn what was to them big money in the hedgeapple harvest. Young men would use barrel staves to knock the fruit from the branches of the trees. The idea was to climb into the tree and swat the ripe fruit toward a coworker on the ground. Since competition was great and workers were paid by the piece, they would sometimes hone their skills at lunch break by tossing unripened (and thus unwanted) fruit to a picker armed with a stout barrel stave. The striker was originally called a "Bitter" because of the tart spray back that sometimes emanated from a smartly struck hedgeapple. Soon a game of sorts developed where the person catching a swatted fruit was allowed to throw the object at the head of the bitter. To avoid being struck the bitter would run to a designated safe spot—usually a wooden crate spaced almost 90 feet away. Because a bruised hedgeapple would sometimes become too slick and slimy to handle after it had been struck a few times, players would sometimes apply a little pine tar resin, called pitch, to their hands to secure a better grip. The apple tosser was often called a pitch guy. Later it was shortened to pitcher. My great-great grandfather, Mortimer Potemkin, was a proponent of using dried bull excrement to dry the hand prior to throwing. He and his family members became known as bull slingers for their efforts. Rules began to evolve and soon a fairly well regulated game developed and served as a vehicle for some heavy gambling. As a matter of fact, the term "hedging one's bet" developed from the practice of Milford bookies who would back up their bets by making counter bets. The main object of the game was to strike a hedgeapple and begin navigating through a series of safe crates before someone could bounce a hedgeapple off your head. Fights and disputes were common and the game seemed to attract the most base elements in surrounding communities. Indeed, the Milford City Council briefly outlawed this "Base Game" following a medical scandal in the 1840's. It seems that young men would get bulked up using the newly invented growth hormones intended for use in the local cattle industry. Hedgeapples were soon being swatted far past the boundaries of the hedgeapple orchards. The game was reinstated and strictly regulated by local politicians when they discovered they could tax the new game and charge spectators to watch. Some communities even used tax dollars to fund huge hedgeapple orchards designed to be used to accommodate the game and spectators!

Milford fielded the first professional team in what was being called Base Apple. The great hedgeapple blight of 1850 limited the fruit supply and almost destroyed the game until alternate objects were chosen. Things looked bleak for a time as local teams struggled through Base Brick, Base Cow Pie, Base Fishhead, Base Dead Chicken and Base Boot before the game was finally saved by a young man who had recently seen the game of croquet being played in Indian Hill. As striking a croquet mallet with a barrel stave seemed rather unrewarding and pointless, someone eventually suggested using the round croquet ball and Base Ball quickly became a nation's pastime. Originally, the term for a player to hit a runner in the head with a hedgeapple was an "ouch". By chance it was decided to allow each side to accumulate three "ouches" before losing their turn. Since being struck in the head with a wooden croquet ball would normally render a runner unconscious, the act was referred to as "knocking out a runner." Eventually it was simply shortened to an out.

Milford High School, having literally dozens of hedgeapple groves in the district, became a leader in the early version of the new sport. Local sportswriters selected Milford as the mythical state champions through most of the early 1800's. To date, these remain the only Milford state championships in a "major" sport. Milford had great difficulty in adapting to the new rules and equipment and tried to maintain the hedgeapple as the game's main object even after the introduction of the new ball started a popular trend that has continued until modern times. Some feel that this reluctance to adapt to new realities has marked the Milford athletic program over the years.

This old photo tells quite a tragic story. The battered and bruised fruit was the one struck by Hezekiah Potemkin for his 59th home run in 1875. This was the last year Milford fielded a team in the old professional Base-Hedgeapple league which folded the following year in the face of competition from the fledgling Base Ball league. Fifty nine home runs remained the home run record until Babe Ruth hit 60 of them in 1927. This hedgeapple was preserved and was to be eventually put on display at Cooperstown. Unfortunately, it was eaten by the family pet goat. Hezekiah Potemkin would be knocked permanently senseless the following year when a fielder whistled a wooden croquet ball off his head while he raced for a safe crate during his tryout with a local base ball team.

The modern hedgeapple grows wild throughout the nation and is now considered a nuisance plant by many who do not know of its glorious history. Early residents of Milford discovered that the hedgeapple could be used as a very effective contraceptive and also could be used with other fruits to ward off a serious disease. Dr. Hippocrates Potemkin was the first to realize that a young lady who kept a small hedgeapple firmly held between her knees on a date could avoid pregnancy. That same year (1899), the Potemkin Clinic discovered that sailors who slept with a hedgeapple in their bed and ate a small lemon or lime every day could avoid the dangerous disease of scurvy. Over the years the Potemkin clinic has accumulsted a number of hedgeapple recipes. Try these tasty treats the next time the gang gets together for a little baseball. Here is a list.