Browning told his teammates about his new bat, which sent a surge of professional ball players to the Hillerich shop. For a brief time in the s, he even turned away ball players. But Bud persisted; he saw the future in bats. The rest is baseball history. Patent Office. In the early s, the growing company pioneered a sports marketing concept by paying Hall of Fame hitter Honus Wagner to use his name on a bat—a practice continued today with Michael Jordan, Tiger Woods and many other professional athletes across virtually all sports.
By , Louisville Slugger was selling more bats than any other bat maker in the country. Some years have passed since Bud Hillerich crafted that very first bat for Pete Browning. Since then, Louisville Slugger has sold more than ,, bats, making it without question the most popular bat brand in baseball history.
In the past decade, many national college baseball champions have also hammered their way to the top with Louisville Slugger bats. In addition to on-field performance products, Louisville Slugger offers personalized, miniature, commemorative and collectible bats.
According to company legend, the first pro bat was created by year-old Bud for Pete Browning in Browning was a megastar on Louisville's major league team, the Eclipse. One spring afternoon, Bud skipped out of work to watch the Eclipse play. He saw Browning break his bat and offered to make a new one at the woodworking shop. According to the story, in the next game Browning got three hits with the bat Bud made. Bud was passionate about adding baseball bats to the family business, but his father wanted no part of that product.
Fred believed the future of the business was a very popular, patented, swinging butter churn. However, Bud Hillerich continued to push for and improve the bat-making business, and even invented some patented processes. The name "Louisville Slugger" became their registered trademark in , and Bud joined his father as a partner in The success of the growing bat company took another leap in when Honus "The Flying Dutchman" Wagner, a superstar shortstop for the Pittsburgh Pirates, signed a contract as the first player ever to endorse a bat.
His autograph was also the first to be used on a bat and the first time a professional athlete endorsed an athletic product. In , Frank Bradsby, a successful salesman for one of the Hillerich's largest buyers, joined J. Hillerich and Son. The Hillerichs knew how to make great bats but lacked professional sales and marketing expertise and drive. A disastrous flood along the Ohio River in did significant damage to the business. Working almost nonstop for weeks to repair the factory, Frank Bradsby was worn down and died later that year.
Bradsby had no heirs, but the Hillerich family has kept his name on the business as a tribute to his amazing contributions to the growth of the company. The corporate headquarters always remained in Louisville. The world-famous facility is hard to miss, just look for The Big Bat, the world's largest baseball bat, delighting guests as they enter.
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