About the Club

Rhode Island's baseball story is older than most people realize. The original Providence Grays ruled the National League from 1878 to 1885, winning pennants in 1879 and 1884 and producing some of the most celebrated players of the early game. That 1884 club (the World's Champions ) remains one of the greatest teams in 19th century baseball history.
In the spring of 1998, a group of Rhode Island fans decided that story deserved to be told on the field, not just in the history books. Inspired by a growing vintage base ball movement in New York, they formed the Providence Grays as a living tribute to that championship era and took the field for the first time that June on the Bristol Town Common.
The rules were nothing like the modern game. Batters called their own pitch, high or low. It took six balls to draw a walk. The pitcher stood just fifty feet away. And most players caught screaming line drives with their bare hands. Some tried, anyway.
More than two decades later, the Grays are the longest-running vintage base ball club in New England , and still going strong. The club has played everywhere from Maine to Maryland, under rules spanning the 1850s through the 1890s, and travels annually to Gettysburg for some of the most celebrated festival action on the vintage base ball calendar. Opponents have come from Ohio, Delaware, Tennessee, and beyond.
The commitment to authenticity has only deepened with time. The Grays take the history seriously (the rules, the customs, the language of the era) while never losing sight of what brought them to the Bristol Common in the first place: a love of the game in its purest form. Follow along on Facebook and Instagram, and come find us on the field.