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RIP to the Ponce de Leon Magnolia
When I first joined the Society for American Baseball Research (SABR), I also joined up with my local chapter. I was living in Atlanta at the time, and that local branch was (and still is) called the Magnolia Chapter. Most of the other branches across the country are named after a baseball great that lived or played in the area, but the Atlanta chapter was named after a tree -- probably the most significant tree in baseball history. The magnolia tree in question was located in the outfield of Atlanta's Ponce de Leon Park, which had been the home of both the minor-league Atlanta Crackers and the Atlanta Black Crackers of the Negro Leagues.
