The Thursday night "pitch" tournament, which runs for 12 weeks beginning on the Thursday after Labor Day and another 12 weeks beginning on the Thursday after New Year's Day, has been around for as long as local residents can remember.

Also known as "High, Low, Jack and Game," pitch is a fast-paced card game with two teams per table, usually consisting of two or three people per team. The current gathering draws between 12 and 18 people, far less than that of 75 years ago, but still enough to keep the tradition going.

According to Jeanette Smith, Springfield historian, the card games began sometime in the early to mid-1920s as one of the many Springfield Men's Club functions. The club house, which is currently an antique shop in Springfield Center, housed a library, a billiard room, a bowling alley and a barber shop.

Some of the current senior players recall that players would take turns buying a round of candy bars from the barber, who used the money from the sale to pay his share of the rent on his shop.

Pitch wasn't always the only game in town , however. Richard Rathbun, a farmer from East Springfield who has been playing cards in these tournaments since the late 1950s, said that "sometimes cribbage was played when there weren't enough players for pitch, but since the mid-1950s, pitch has been the only game played."

Dave Smith, 72, a retired contractor from Springfield Center, played pitch or cribbage with his father at the men's club as "a kid in school," more than 60 years ago. He is now exclusively playing pitch, and has been for the last 40 years.

"People came from a widespread area back then, some from Warren, Richfield and Cherry Valley, and many more Springfield people played than now," Dave Smith said. "Sometimes we'd get as many as 40 people."

The men's club closed in the late 1930s due to deterioration of the building and a shortage of new members, but a small group of devoted card players moved the game to the Shingle Inn in Springfield Center.

When the inn closed down, it was on to Burger World in Springfield Center, then briefly to the Springfield Grange Hall, and finally to the current location at the Springfield Fire Company No. 1 on Route 20 in East Springfield.

The move to the fire house was suggested by Jeanette Smith, then of the Ladies Auxiliary. The ladies offered to serve the refreshments, but up until about five years ago women didn't play. Today there are just as many women playing as men, including some younger women who enjoy not only the game, but the social aspect as well.

"It's more than sitting there and playing cards," said Christine Erway, a restaurant manager from Cherry Valley and a Thursday night regular at the fire house. "You get to talk with everybody and listen to the senior's stories about the past. I'd like to see the tournaments continue, it's good that younger people are getting involved. I encourage younger people to come and play and have fun, and keep the tradition going."

Interested people sign-up at the fire house in East Springfield at the beginning of each session for $5, and are assigned a team, either black or red.

The total number of games won is tallied, and, at the end of the session, the winning team is treated to supper by the losing team - another tradition that was created by the tournament's founders more than 75 years ago.