Photos by Jared Soares | The Roanoke Times

Salem-Roanoke Baseball Hall of Fame president Charlie Hammersley (left) sorts through local baseball memorabilia from past seasons.

Local baseball memorabilia such as these items will go on display at the Roanoke-Salem Baseball Hall of Fame, which opens Saturday.

Legend has it that the seats are from the old Yankee Stadium. The House the Ruth Built.

Charlie Hammersley only knows for sure that the wood they are made from is from the right era and the right area. And that former Salem Civic Center czar Jack Dame bought them for the ballpark formerly known as Salem Municipal Stadium in the late 1950s from a failing minor league team in upstate New York.

And that's the story the sellers told at the auction: The seats originally came from Yankee Stadium.

Carey Harveycutter, Dame's protege and current director of civic facilities for Salem, said that's the story he heard from Dame. "But I was just a kid."

No one may ever know for sure whether those seats ever bore witness to the exploits of the great Babe Ruth, but they most certainly were there at what is now Kiwanis Field when the 1965 Salem Rebels won the Appalachian League championship, and when Dave Parker was tearing up the Carolina League for the Salem Rebels in 1972, falling one homer shy of the Triple Crown.

And they were there on Aug. 22, 1974, when promising Salem Pirates right fielder Alfredo Edmead came running in for a shallow fly ball and collided, head to knee, with second baseman Pablo Cruz, his friend and mentor. Edmead died from his injuries.

A section of those seats has a home now, along with plaques commemorating Parker, Dame, Cruz, Hammersley, Harveycutter and a host of others who have made an impact on the game of baseball in the area.

The Salem-Roanoke Baseball Hall of Fame, 18 years after its inception, is opening its doors at 4 p.m. Saturday with a ribbon-cutting ceremony and tours of the facility and its artifacts.

The hall building is located outside the left-field side of Salem Memorial Ballpark behind the Salem Red Sox front office.

Hammersley became the hall's president after the death of founding president and driving force Posey Oyler in January. Another founding board member, long-time Roanoke Times sportswriter Bob Teitlebaum, died last August.

"We were kind of disappointed because we wanted Posey to be the first one to cut the ribbon," Hammersley said. "And it's disappointing because 'Teits' passed away. We decided right then and there we needed to get this thing open."

Another hall legend has it that Teitlebaum and former Salem general manager Sam Lazzaro were talking about the possibility of a local baseball hall of fame during a Carolina League game at Municipal Field, when Oyler happened to join the conversation. By the end of the game, Oyler had rounded up half a board of directors and by September 1991, the hall was officially in business.

The makeup of the board has changed a bit over the years as neither Hammersley nor vice president Gary Walthall were on the original board.

One thing never changed: Oyler was always in charge.

"We didn't even have keys [to the building] when Posey died," Hammersley said.

"We didn't even know how to turn on the lights," Walthall said.

Oyler, a general contractor, arranged regular board meetings and put himself in charge of the annual banquet, fundraising and getting the building built.

"Posey did everything," Hammersley said. "He did 99 percent of the work. ... The reason this building is here is because of Posey Oyler."

It has been a long time coming. The first class was inducted in the winter of 1992 with the plaques temporarily housed at the Salem Civic Center. The board broke ground for the building in 2003, but the need for money stalled its completion.

From the start, the board recognized not just players but coaches, managers and others who contributed to the game, limiting their scope to seven counties -- Roanoke, Bedford, Botetourt, Craig, Floyd, Franklin and Montgomery -- and the independent cities inside their borders.

Enshrined along with major leaguers such as Parker, Johnny Oates, Al Holland, Walter "Steve" Brodie, Billy Sample, Ron Hodges and Billy Wagner are local heroes, like Bill "Hawkbill" Hall, who played semi-pro ball before becoming a volunteer coach and founder of an umpires association in Franklin County, and Junior Epperly, who coached Sample and hundreds of others in his 20-year run in the sandlots of Salem.

Alvin Hall, who organized Franklin County's first Little League team in 1957, is enshrined along with Negro League star Larry Legrande.

Ferrum College coaching legend Abe Naff is enshrined along with his players Wagner and Eric Owens, who both made it to the big leagues.

Virginia Tech is well represented by not only Oates, who followed up his Hokies career with 11 seasons as a big league catcher and 11 more as a major league manager, but also major leaguers Franklin Stubbs and Leo Burke -- as well as long-time coach Chuck Hartman.

There are scouts, including Kid Carr and Kelvin Bowles, though both had other claims to fame.

Even -- gasp -- umpires are honored.

Former Municipal Field grounds keeper Murray Cook (legend has it he once grew grass inside his house), who grew up to become an international force in baseball field design and construction, has a plaque.

The stories of the 83 inductees are told on their individual plaques, and several have donated balls, bats, uniforms and other artifacts from their playing days to the hall.

Russ Peters, a Roanoke native who spent 10 seasons in the majors between 1936 and 1947, donated a uniform and one of his big league contracts. It reads more like an order than an offer. Two-thirds of the small sheet of paper concerns spring training in Mexico City, and half of that explains how wives are not invited because the team is planning "a real stag party."

The Appalachian League pennants from Salem's championship teams in 1955 and '65 hang in the hall courtesy of Bucky Dame, son of the late Jack Dame.

As he and Walthall and fellow board member Dick Williams were setting up a video display of tapes of past induction ceremonies in preparation for Saturday's grand opening, Hammersley said he hoped that more people would either donate or lend items to be displayed in the hall.

"This is just the beginning," Hammersley said.

Assuming, of course, they can figure out the lights.

Hammersley and Walthall both claim that it is entirely by accident that the plaque for Teitlebaum ended up on the far left side of the hall of famers' wall, while the plaque for Oyler ended up on the far right.

It had absolutely nothing to do with their relative positions on the political spectrum when both were alive. Arguments between the two -- both loved to argue -- were legendary.

"They were so different," Hammersley said with a smile and a shake of his head. "The both loved baseball, but that's where it ended. ...

"I wish we could've [video] taped the board meetings."

Walthall suspects Teitlebaum and Oyler may yet be replaying those debates.

"We've left the building and turned out the lights, and come back the next day and the lights are on," Walthall said laughing.

"I know it's them."