“When I talk about it, my eyes well up,” she said.

Myke remember players as young as 7 and 8-years-old playing with great pride to have ‘Dundas’ on their jersey.

“It was the way they conducted themselves. I was so proud of them,” she said.

She recalls those young players competing with great sportsmanship, character and effort – regardless of how deep they made it into a tournament.

“It was about learning and understanding the game, being part of a team. Regardless of how far you got,“ Myke said. “They took pride in their community. We taught them they were playing for their town.”

Jeff Kozak of Dundas Little League said the t-ball tournament started in 2008 It grew from four teams to 11 teams and peaked at 21 teams in 2012. The past two seasons levelled off at about 15 teams.

“The growth and popularity of T-ball is a local success story in building a generation of great ball payers, many of whom still play today in little league and in Dundas Minor Baseball,” Kozak said. “But the roots were put down by league leaders like Charlene years ago.”

He said the league is at a healthy size right now with about 230 players. It has been as high as 300 in recent years, but Kozak said the league is confident that baseball is growing again in popularity. He said they decided to rename the organization’s three different tournaments to honour Dundas Little League’s history. A minor tournament for nine and ten year olds was renamed after Wes Snihur, another longtime volunteer

“From what I gather, the numbers in little league and t-ball aren’t what it was when we were begging the town to build more diamonds,” Myke said. ”They have a good core of people who are trying to bring the numbers back.”

Dundas Little League was established in 1954, and currently offers baseball programs for children aged five to 12 in four divisions: FUNdamentals, T-ball, Minor Baseball and Major Baseball..

For more information visit www.dundaslittleleague.ca/