Richmond Virginians
The Richmond Virginians was the name of a minor league baseball Class AAA International League franchise that played in Richmond, Virginia, from 1954 through 1964.
The minor-league Virginians were the transplanted version of the International League edition of the Baltimore Orioles, who were uprooted from their Maryland home when the St. Louis Browns of Major League Baseball transferred there for the 1954 season.
The Virginians were unaffiliated with a major league farm system during 1954 and 1955, and — despite being managed by a Hall of Famer, Luke Appling — they wallowed at the bottom of the IL standings. The team's fortunes improved in 1956, when it affiliated with the New York Yankees. The Virginians, the Yanks' sole AAA farm club after 1958, sent several key players to the Bronx, but the club's attendance figures were usually in the bottom tier of the league.
After the 1964 season, the Virginians were transferred to Toledo, Ohio, to become the present-day edition of the Mud Hens. Richmond was without baseball in 1965, but gained its longtime IL franchise, the Richmond Braves, when the Atlanta Crackers transferred there the following season. After 43 seasons in Richmond, the club moved to Gwinnett County, Georgia, for the 2009 campaign. In, Virginia's capital joined the Class AA Eastern League with the creation of the Richmond Flying Squirrels, an affiliate of the San Francisco Giants.
At one point, the Virginians were the only minor league affiliate of the Yankees allowed to keep their nickname instead of adopting the Yankees name. Today, the Yankees have four minor league affiliates that don't use the Yankees nickname: the Scranton/Wilkes-Barre RailRiders, the Trenton Thunder, the Charleston RiverDogs, and the Tampa Tarpons.
