Franchise Highlight: The Chicago Packers
What the Packers have lacked in on-field success, they have made up for in terms of intimidation. The Packers’ blue-collar fans, employed in Chicago's booming meatpacking industry, frequently attend games wearing blood-stained aprons. Ultimately, the Packers will need a steady hand to redefine roster and to avoid the ire of their dangerous fanbase.
Set against the bustling Polish neighborhood of Buck Town in the Wicker Park District, the Packers of Powers Field play against a noisy and bustling working-class community near the newly-constructed Wicker Park train line.
Hand-selected from the best city meat-packer baseball organization, local politician and banker Horatio Powers bankrolled the formation of the Chicago Packers in 1891 and secured several lucrative contracts with the city to construct a crude and unappealing ballpark amidst the dim and coal-swept brick neighborhood lined with factories and church towers.
The Packers are a tough, mean, and unforgiving lot–just like their diehard fans, who leave work an hour early for home games to line the stadium seats often still adorned in their bloodied aprons and coveralls. This is quite the sight to visiting teams, and generates the sort of intimidating air the Packers pride themselves in producing each home game.
As the legend goes, long before Wicker Park incorporated into the municipality of Chicago, “Buck Town” was so-named for the many goats who would wander the Polish shacks and alleyways. In this tradition, each home game begins with a parade of “The Great Goat of Bucktown,” a goat selected by Mr. Powers each spring to be spared the factory. The goat has it’s own booth near center field, and is indiscriminately named “Bucky.” So, in north Chicago, the Packers and their fans are often affectionately referred to as “Buckies.”