As Bob Dylan so astutely noted way back in 1964, “The times, they are a-changin.”
It’s certainly something Leominster native Mark Lefebvre noted as he set to work on his recently-published book, “A Place in Time: Youth, Community & Baseball,” which not only looks at the three straight Babe Ruth state titles claimed by Leominster in the early 1970s, but the sense of community created by the feat.
Lefebvre was a member of the 1973 state championship, the last in the string of consecutive titles and was “bit by the writing bug” after talking to friend and former football teammate Mark Bodanza, Leominster’s well-known gridiron historian.
“It was March of 2021 when I started talking to Mark about it.
” ‘We have all these books about Leominster and it’s football history, but nothing about baseball,’ I remember saying to him,” Lefebvre recalled in a Zoom interview. “He thought it was a good idea to explore possibly putting something together about those teams. Mark and I talked about it and I ran with it and here we are.”
The backdrop of the book is Leominster in the early 1970s, zeroing in on the 1971-73 Babe Ruth teams that claimed state championships and went on to play much broader domestic and international competition. It’s a feat that’s been accomplished only twice in Massachusetts, with Leominster owning both of the three-peats.
“I thought it would be nice to get a book out that celebrates that unbelievable run of three consecutive state championships,” said Lefebvre, a consultant for Pinetree Institute, a non-profit organization that assists communities in Maine and New Hampshire build their capacity to address substance use disorder in communities. “It’s the 50th anniversary of the 1972 team and the team I played on has its 50th anniversary next year, so the timing just felt right.”
Leominster’s run of dominance was something to behold and nearly extended a year longer, but the 1974 team fell in the state final, with that contest ending via a groundout with the bases loaded.
The team ran into multiple players with future MLB connections during that three-year run, including former Major Leaguer of Joe Lefebvre — no relation — and former San Francisco Giants executive Brian Sabean, who helped guide the club to three World Series titles. Those and more are documented in Lefevbre’s book.
He estimates somewhere in the neighborhood of 40 players took part in those championships, with a few players carrying over onto multiple 15-man rosters. Of the 34 surviving members of those groups, Lefebvre talked to 28 for the book, developing profiles of each for the tome, as well as talking to coaches and getting in contact with players who came before and after the title run.
“We all grew up together through Little League feeder systems, playing alone on playgrounds,” Lefebvre said. “We knew when the games were and we’d just show up. You always had enough guys to play. It’s a little different now with the amount of things kids can do.
“They can’t get enough kids to field an all-star team. The scoreboard is dark.”
Upon reflecting on the difference he saw in his childhood and young people now, Lefebvre realized his telling of Leominster’s Babe Ruth dominance was a tale of more than just baseball. He was indeed looking into a place and time when things were much different, when industrial and mill towns were thriving.
Not only have participation numbers dropped for baseball in the past 50 years — “I’d guess they have a tenth of the players we had,” Lefebvre estimates — but the sense of community around sports and recreational activities become much more focused, not casting as wide a net as what he experienced in his formative years.
“The more I got into it and the more players I talked to and the more research I did, I realized what we had was something special from a community standpoint,” Lefebvre said. “It was almost like the community was a warm blanket around us. The sheer amount of kids playing was incredible.
“Some of the leagues have folded, some have merged. Babe Ruth is more of a regional thing rather than a town thing. The game has changed so much and so has the sense of community in a lot of the places I’ve seen.”
Lefebvre has netted positive reviews from Boston Globe scribe Dan Shaugnessy and renowned sportswriter Gordon Edes, a Central Mass native. And now he’s looking forward to hearing thoughts from others.
“At its roots, it’s a book about community centered around a great baseball program,” Lefebvre said. “I think a lot can be taken from it regarding how life was then and what things might have been a bit better for society then. But it’s still a way to give credit to a group of baseball players for an unbelievable achievement and how those years set them up for success throughout their lives.”
