Who are the Anchorage Glacier Pilots?

Bob Reeve is the original 'Glacier Pilot'.  He was a pioneer in the aviation world and the first Chairman of the Glacier Pilots Board.  He and wife, Tilly, kept the Glacier Pilots baseball organization going strong through the early years.  Without them, there would be no Glacier Pilots baseball team today.

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  1969 to NOW.  Playball!

The Anchorage Glacier Pilots are a college summer baseball team in Anchorage, Alaska. They are part of the Alaska Baseball League, and a member of the National Baseball Congress.

Well, that's the basics.  The fun part of their story is that the Pilots and Alaska (Fairbanks) Goldpanners heated rivalry changed American Baseball as a whole. They were the first teams to embrace the use of college baseball players in the late 1960's, when students were off from school in the summer months. The Alaska Teams, their clubs loaded with college baseball players, started whipping the tar out of the other teams in the National Baseball Congress Championship in Wichita, Kansas.  

 It didn't take long for the other American minor league teams to follow the Alaskan example. Soon, college coaches from across the country (like Rod Dedeux of USC) were sending their best ball players to The Last Frontier for a trial by fire, ice, and moose in the Alaskan wildernesses of Anchorage and Fairbanks!

​Some of the great baseball players to have come through the Glacier Pilots dugout reads like a who's who of Major League Baseball Alumni: Mark McGwire, Randy Johnson, Mickey Hatcher, Suguru Egawa, Dan Boone, Randy Jones, Chris Chambliss, Dave Winfield, Tom Seaver, Bump Wills, Graig Nettles, and Rick Monday, to name a few.

The Pilots were the National Baseball Congress World Series champions in 1969, the year the Glacier Pilots Baseball Club was formed.  No other team has won the NBC World Series in their first year.  The Pilots won the NBC World Series again in 1971, 1986, 1991 and 2001. They have also won multiple Alaskan League Championships. Team colors are royal blue and white. Home games are played at Mulcahy Stadium in Anchorage.

For more information, schedules, trivia, tickets, and memorabilia go to www.glacierpilots.com

1968 - Genesis of the Glacier Pilots

Jack O'Toole recalls the creation of the Anchorage Glacier Pilots baseball club taking inspiration from Red Boucher's Alaska Goldpanners in Fairbanks, Jack, Joe Keenan and Bernie Kosinski organized the Glacier Pilots and the epic Alaskan baseball rivalry began.

This and other great Alaskan baseball  stories can be found on "Lefty & Jack" DVD sold thru the Anchorage Glacier Pilots store at www.glacerpilots.com

​select photos courtesy of www.goldpanners.com