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J. Lee Richmond’s Remarkable 1879 Season
Worcester Base Ball Club, 1879 Completing our three-post week dedicated to the late lamented Worcester National League club, here is a fine article by John Richmond Husman, a friend ever since he...
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Old News in Baseball, No. 3
Like the proverbial bad penny, “Old News” is back, this time focusing on events from the week of May 15-21. The weather is heating up prematurely (at least back East, where I hammer out this column)...
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The Only Nolan
Ed “The Only” Nolan Who was Edward Sylvester Nolan? Look at his stats page at baseball-reference.com and one is hardly impressed: a lifetime pitching record of 23-52 in five seasons in the big leagues,...
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Old News in Baseball, No. 4
This is getting to be a habit—one darn week after another—and there is so much great baseball history to share with you. “Old News” is chugging along, with this fourth entry featuring events of May...
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The Pitcher’s Art
Tim Murnane I spotted this in the Brownstown, Indiana Banner of July 8, 1887, but it originates with the Boston Globe, for which Tim Murnane long served as sporting editor and columnist. I wrote...
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Old News in Baseball, No. 5
This week we leave May behind and enter June, having completed about 30 percent of the 2015 regular-season campaign. The newsboy depicted at left is probably shouting, “Extra! Extra! Read all about...
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Sketch of National Game of Baseball by George Wright
George Wright in 1924 George Wright (1847-1937), the first hero of the professional era in baseball, presented this little essay in person at the Columbia Historical Society in Washington, D.C. on May...
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Old News in Baseball, No. 6
Baseball is a comforting game, echoing the rhythms and events of games gone by and recalling the past, one’s own and the nation’s. Yet even for those who have witnessed thousands of games, baseball...
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The Oldest Trick in the Book
The hidden-ball trick is defined as “a time- honored legal ruse in which a baseman conceals the ball and hopes that the base runner believes it has been returned to the pitcher. When the runner steps...
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Old News in Baseball, No. 7
A few days ago, courtesy of a nameless headline writer at a newspaper in Bend, Oregon, baseball fans were apprised of yet another historic first: an amphibious pitcher. As you will see from an entry...
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Shoeless Joe, the Bambino, the Big Bankroll, and the Jazz Age
Shoeless Joe, W.P. Kinsella Most of you have read Shoeless Joe, a novel of magical realism by Bill Kinsella, whom I knew a little bit thirty years ago, before he finished that book and before I became...
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Old News in Baseball, No. 8
This week begins with one of baseball’s big lies—that a baseball game between two distinct clubs (“the first match game”)—was played on June 19, 1846. The city of Hoboken will continue to celebrate...
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Anatomy of a Murder: The Federal League and the Courts
The National Pastime, Spring 1985 Gary Hailey wrote this splendidly detailed story about the Federal League for The National Pastime, a publication I created for the Society for American Baseball...
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Anatomy of a Murder: The Federal League and the Courts, Part 2
Baseball Magazine, Federal League Gary Hailey’s article continues from yesterday (http://goo.gl/GyXEQI). JOHNSON FIGHTS BACK Walsh never wrote to American League president Ban Johnson, as Lichtenheim...
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Anatomy of a Murder: The Federal League and the Courts, Part 3
Official Federal League baseball Gary Hailey’s article continues from yesterday (http://goo.gl/GyXEQI). PEACE TALKS Baltimore officials did hear rumors that some Federal League owners were negotiating...
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Anatomy of a Murder: The Federal League and the Courts, Part 4
Federal League Tobacco Tin Gary Hailey’s article continues from yesterday (http://goo.gl/hhR5N1). THE WAR MOVES TO THE COURTROOM On January 27, the Baltimore stockholders voted to authorize the club’s...
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Old News in Baseball, No. 9
Well, last week was the week that was … and in this column, so is next week. The past is present, especially in baseball, reflected in current events and providing background and context that...
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Self Portrait
Mark Ruckhaus interviewed me some time back, and the story runs in the current issue of “The Inside Game: The Official Newsletter of SABR’s Deadball Era Committee.” I think it may be of passing...
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Old News in Baseball, No. 10
Debuts and swan songs. Triumphs and tragedies. July 4th and the All-Star Game. Baseball and America, indivisible … let Walt Whitman take over for me now. In his last years, living in Camden, New...
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Why Discriminate?
Welday Walker, Akron, 1887 Welday (also spelled Weldy) Wilberforce Walker was one of two African-American brothers to play in Major League Baseball in 1884, with the Toledo Blue Stockings of the...
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