Tobs 101: A Tobacco Town, a Ballpark, and a Whole Lot of Baseball

Good morning gentle JOCO readers,

Last time, we followed the Mudcats to Wilson. This time, we're meeting the home team. Before we can untangle leases, stadium deals, public money, and how a championship baseball team ended up packing its bags for Smithfield, we need to talk about the Wilson Tobs.

Because the Tobs aren't just another summer baseball team. They're Wilson history. They're tobacco roots, hometown pride, championship banners, decades of memories, and one very old ballpark that's seen more drama than a season finale of a reality TV show. So, grab your peanuts and Cracker Jack. Class is back in session, and today we're taking Tobs 101.

Tobs 101: A Tobacco Town, a Ballpark, and a Whole Lot of Baseball

Before we get to the drama (and there’s drama), you should know who the Wilson Tobs are. This is a team that has died, come back, changed names, changed leagues, and nearly changed zip codes more times than most of us have changed phone plans.

Why “Tobs”?

It’s short for “tobacconists.” Wilson was a tobacco town, and the team wore it proudly. According to Wikipedia, the nickname is a shortened form of “tobacconists,” and the club played on and off between 1908 and 1973. The Tobacconists won the league title in 1909. In the 1920s, the team went by the Wilson Bugs, because apparently one tobacco-themed name wasn’t enough.

The golden age: back-to-back titles and a 20-game cushion-

Baseball Reference’s Bullpen says baseball returned to Wilson in 1939 in the Coastal Plain League, with the Tobs playing at Wilson Municipal Stadium. They finished sixth that first year, then got serious. They captured the league title in 1940, going 77-49 per StatsCrew, and then showed off in 1941. The Tobs went 87-30 and won the championship by more than 20 games over the runner-up, led by pitcher-manager Bill Herring (16-3, 2.25 ERA). Wikipedia notes the 1941 team was later named one of the 100 greatest minor league teams of all time. Not bad for a small tobacco town.

The war interrupted things. Bullpen says the league shut down, the Tobs moved to the Bi-State League in 1942 and won another title, then returned after the war and finished first in 1947 at 79-61 before the team folded after 1952.

Baseball came back in the mid-50s. Per Bullpen, a new Tobs team played 13 Carolina League seasons, winning titles in 1959, 1961 and 1963, and featuring future Hall of Famer Rod Carew in 1966. StatsCrew shows the crowds: 80,409 fans in 1956, but by 1967 the total had sunk to 20,108. Wilson fans, it seems, are loud when you’re winning and busy when you’re not.

In 1973 the team came back one more time as the Wilson Pennants. Fun fact: owner Marshall Fox even managed one game himself, and the team finished dead last at 52-88. The same source notes pro baseball never returned to Wilson after that.

The Tobs’ own website says the team was gone for 23 years, from 1974 to 1996, and the brand lived on because of the shared memories at Fleming Stadium. Then, in 1997, the Tobs came back as an original member of the collegiate Coastal Plain League, a wood-bat summer league for college players. Wikipedia lists a few highlights from that era: a tobacco-worm mascot named Slugger since 1999 and the league’s Organization of the Year award in 2005.

Ownership changed hands too. Greg Suire and Richard Holland bought the team in 2010, according to the Wilson Times (via Restoration NewsMedia).

After years of close calls, the Tobs finally won it all. The Randolph Record reported the 2025 championship, the Tobs’ first in the Coastal Plain League, came with a 10-9 comeback over Forest City after trailing 8-1. Per Wikipedia, it was a 2-0 series win. And how did the franchise celebrate? By getting ready to leave Wilson.

And then there’s Fleming Stadium. Baseball Parks calls it a 3,000-seat park that opened in 1939 and still stands. Bullpen notes Wilson Municipal was renamed Fleming in 1952. WECT reported the North Carolina Baseball Museum sits right along the third-base line. Wikipedia adds that the Carolina Mudcats used it briefly as their home in 1991, which, as you know from the last post, is a plot point.

But 80-plus years is a lot of years. According to the City of Wilson, some seating was closed in 2022 because of structural problems, and a $368,000 short-term repair was done before the 2023 season, with more than $1 million invested over the past decade. A 2025 engineer’s report reportedly found structural problems and code shortfalls. A Wilson Times columnist noted the 2013 renovation cost $580,000, with the Tobs chipping in $50,000 in cash and value. Fleming has been a long-time tenant-and-landlord arrangement, with both sides patching a historic grandstand.

So, what happens when a century of baseball meets a lease? You now know the cast: a tobacco-town team with a trophy case, a ballpark older than most of your grandparents, and a championship the team won on its way out the door. Here’s the part that kept me up past my bedtime: a rent check, a pile of public money, a brand-new stadium 25 miles away, and a team that ended up in Smithfield instead.

Who paid for what? What did anybody agree to, and when? And who exactly gets to play where? I’m digging into the leases, the money, and the paperwork, and I’m going to show you what the record says and where it goes quiet.

Grab a snack. The next innings are going to be good.

That is all for now!

Carry on!

©2026 The JOCO Sass, Dispatch, LLC

Sources

Wikipedia: Wilson Tobs (minor league baseball); Wilson Tobs; Coastal Plain League; Fleming Stadium

Baseball Reference Bullpen: Wilson Tobs (also source for the 1940 title)

StatsCrew: Wilson Tobs franchise history

Wilson Tobs official statement (wilsontobs.com)

FunWhileItLasted: 1973 Wilson Pennants

Randolph Record: “College Baseball Notes”

Restoration NewsMedia / Wilson Times: “Tobs hope to keep rolling beyond 2025” and “Tobs exploring move to Smithfield”

City of Wilson: “An Update on Fleming Stadium”

WECT: Wilson baseball museum story

Baseball Parks: Wilson Ballpark entry