Background
Alfred James Reach was born on May 25, 1840 in London, England, the son of Benjamin and Elizabeth (Dyball) Reach. In his infancy his parents emigrated to the United States and settled in Brooklyn, New York.
Alfred James Reach was born on May 25, 1840 in London, England, the son of Benjamin and Elizabeth (Dyball) Reach. In his infancy his parents emigrated to the United States and settled in Brooklyn, New York.
On the sand lots of this city he gained his first reputation as a ball player. The ability which he displayed won him a position on the Eckford team, organized in 1855, which had its grounds at Greenpoint, an outlying community of Brooklyn.
In 1865 Col. Thomas Fitzgerald, owner of the old Philadelphia Athletics, induced him to join that nine at a salary of twenty-five dollars a week "for expenses. " Baseball was still, nominally at least, an amateur sport, and Reach was the first player in Philadelphia to receive a stated sum for his services. With this organization he remained more than ten years.
It traveled about the country and became a member of the National Association of Base Ball Players when that body was formed in 1871, and of the National League which succeeded it in 1876.
In the meantime Reach became one of the greatest players of that period. He was a good second baseman, a hard left-hand hitter, and a clever base runner. When in 1876 the New York Clipper picked the first All-American team he was given a place on it; and of the second basemen between the years 1870 and 1880 his name is coupled with that of Ross Barnes as the most notable.
After he stopped playing he continued his interest in the game and was one of the original backers of the present Philadelphia National League Club. For many years, beginning in 1883, he published the Reach Official.
He was not the type of athlete that squanders his earnings and dies young. On the contrary, he became a millionaire and lived to be eighty-seven. His parents were in humble circumstances and his first money was earned as a newsboy. When he became a professional ball player, he was an iron moulder. After going to Philadelphia he opened a cigar store, which became a gathering place for sporting men. Later, he started a sporting-goods store, in which venture Benjamin F. Shibe, also noted as a baseball promoter, soon joined him. It developed into one of the leading establishments of its kind in the country, under the name of A. J. Reach Company. One of its specialties was the manufacture of baseballs, which were wound on a machine said to have been invented by Reach.
His death occurred in Atlantic City, New Jersey.
He was married, December 25, 1866, to Louise Betts of Brooklyn, who with four children survived him.