Suspicious blaze destroys Little League building, memorabilia

Published 6:00 am Sunday, March 4, 2007

Decades of summertime memories were lost in a blaze that badly damaged the scorekeeper’s booth at Rotary Field on Weaver Road Sunday morning.

The two-story building, which sits behind home plate at Bainbridge Island Little League’s largest diamond, remained standing but was so damaged structurally as to be considered a total loss. The blaze is considered “suspicious,” fire officials said.

“They can burn it down, do whatever, but we’re going to rebuild,” Bainbridge Island Little League President Mike Sheehan said. “We’re going to play baseball and softball, and they can’t stop it.”

The loss can’t be measured in the building itself, officials said. Years of Little League memorabilia was destroyed, including irreplaceable trophies and banners from past championships and the Bainbridge Island All-Stars’ 2001 run to the Little League World Series.

“The bad feeling that people have is what hurts the most,” said Terry Lande, director of the Bainbridge Island Metropolitan Park and Recreation District, which owns and maintains the park and its fields. “They lost things that have a lot of Little League history to them.”

The blaze was reported by passersby around 7:05 a.m., and fire crews arrived to find heavy smoke pouring from the building. Flames breached the outside wall facing the baseball diamond before the fire was put out.

The building’s rough inside walls and stairs were badly burnt, and baseball bats, uniforms and other equipment were destroyed. Several batter’s helmets lay in ruin beside the field’s American flag, amid charred wood and foul puddled water on the floor.

The building, dubbed “Ed’s Shed” for a past Little League volunteer, was believed to be at least 30 years old.

Its contents had already been extensively damaged in a break-in several days prior, Sheehan said. Earlier in the week, someone entered the upstairs area overlooking the diamond and destroyed trophies and other memorabilia. Several dozen beer and liquor bottles were found strewn about, and evidence of small fires was found. No arrests have been made in that incident.

The break-in and blaze were just the latest in an ongoing spate of vandalism at the park. Even as fire investigators picked through the debris of the scorekeeper’s booth, volunteers across the grounds were rebuilding the Rotary Field snack shack, badly damaged by vandals last fall.

Sheehan said league officials would meet Monday to figure out how to replace the scorekeeper’s booth in time for the baseball and softball season, which opens in just a month. The Bainbridge community will be asked to help in the rebuilding effort, he said.

The damage saddened players who gathered at the field Sunday, including Erin Kinney and Lauren Sheehan, both members of last year’s softball All-Star team.

“It’s not right — all that’s going to take money to replace,” said Sheehan, age 11, who ascribed the damage to “probably high schoolers who got drunk.”

Both girls lamented the loss of trophies and banners that commemorated years of youth play, including their own.

“It’s hard to get a trophy back,” said Kinney, age 12. “It doesn’t many anything if you replace it, because it’s not the one you actually won.”

Anyone with information on the blaze or previous vandalism at the baseball field is asked to call Bainbridge Police at 842-5211.