The Eckford Social Club was founded as the Eckford Baseball Club in 1855 by a group of shipwrights and dock laborers employed at Eckford and Webb’s shipyard, located on the New York side of the East River between Houston and Tenth Streets. The Williamsburg members of the team found a playing field in Brooklyn’s 15th Ward and in 1860 moved to the Union Grounds, later the site of the 47th Regiment Armory. The club’s first president, Frank Pidgeon, was a dockbuilder and a leading pitcher of his day. The baseball club evolved into a social club, which was chartered in 1865 in Williamsburg and relocated to 95 Broadway, near the East River, in 1888.
Famous members of the club have included Al Reach, a nineteenth-century sporting goods manufacturer, and John L. Smith, president of Charles Pfizer, Inc. and minority owner of the Brooklyn Dodgers from 1945 to 1950. During the twentieth century, the club’s members included many Irish-American businessmen, doctors, lawyers, and other professionals.
From the guide to the Eckford Social Club Scrapbook, Bulk, 1899-1956, [1871]-1961, bulk 1899-1956, (Brooklyn Historical Society)
