Happy birthday to Charlie Ferguson, who threw the Philadelphia Phillies franchise’s first no-hitter as a member of the 1885 Philadelphia Quakers.

Charlie Ferguson threw the Phillies' first no-hitter as a member of the 1885 Philadelphia Quakers.

Charlie Ferguson threw the Phillies’ first no-hitter as a member of the 1885 Philadelphia Quakers.

Ferguson, born 152 years ago today, no-hit the National League’s Providence Grays on Saturday, August 29, 1885 at Philadelphia’s Recreation Park.

The Reading Times noted a rivalry between Quakers pitchers Ferguson and Ed Daily, who held Providence to two hits the day before.

“Both are doing remarkably fine work just at present,” the paper noted, “but Ferguson’s achievement Saturday of retiring the Providence club without a hit ranks as first.”

The two hurlers pitched quite similarly over the 1885 season. Ferguson posted a 26-20 record with a 2.22 ERA, while Daily notched a 26-23 record with a 2.21 ERA.

Category: No-no birthdaysLeave a comment

Author: Dirk Lammers

Dirk Lammers is a veteran journalist who began rooting for the New York Mets in the early-1970s when the team’s no no-hitter count was barely 2,000 games old. Lammers has since turned his research into Baseball’s No-Hit Wonders: More Than a Century of Pitching’s Greatest Feats (Unbridled Books) and NoNoHitters.com, where he maintains the Internet's largest archive of no-hitter information.

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