Rise of the National Game
Baseball evolved
by three main stages
1.
2.
3.
Simple, informal folk game played mostly by boys.
Contrary to myth propagated by organized baseball,
Abner Doubleday did not invent baseball.
Club-based fraternal game. In the 1840s and
1850s young men in several large cities formalized
the bat and ball games by organizing clubs and
adopting written rules; they played for personal
pleasure and not for spectators
Formation of the National League in 1876 signalled
the full arrival of baseball as a business enterprise
and a commercial, spectator-centered sport
Children across
America played
different versions of
bat and ball games
since colonial times
These bat and ball games were similar
to the English game of rounders
Abner Doubleday (1819-1893)
was a United States Army officer
who fired the first shot in the
defense of Fort Sumter. In 1907,
the National League concluded
that that "the first scheme for
playing baseball, according to the
best evidence obtainable to date,
was devised by Abner Doubleday
at Cooperstown, New York, in
1839.” In truth, Doubleday never
made such a claim, and there is
no evidence to support it.
In the 1840s, assorted “gentlemen” (clerks, store keepers,
professional men, brokers) began playing town ball.
Wall Street, 1867
In 1842,
they
gathered
regularly at a
vacant lot at
27th Street
and
4th Avenue
in
Manhattan
Lower Manhattan, 1847
2nd Avenue, looking north from 42nd Street
One of the baseball players
was Alexander Cartwright, a
bank clerk and volunteer
firefighter with the
Knickerbocker Engine
Company No. 12.
When the vacant lot
became unavailable,
Cartwright urged the men to
find a permanent playing
site and form a club
During this time, much
of the land in Hoboken,
New Jersey – just
across the Hudson
River from Manhattan was owned by the
wealthy and
politically-connected
John Cox Stevens.
Steven wished to parcel
out his property for sale
to New York residents.
In order to attract visitors, Stevens sectioned off a riverfront parcel,
dubbed Elysian Fields, as a country-like retreat for the masses.
Elysian Fields
The idyllic setting offered a weekend and evening getaway from
hectic, unhealthy city life. During the park’s heyday, visitors were
treated to parades, fireworks, amusement rides, community events,
ice skating, religious retreats, landscaped gardens, a promenade,
cricket playing, variety of food and drink, a restorative drinking spa,
duels, hot air balloon displays, concessions of many sorts, cattle
auctions, bowling, bands, concerts, plays, optical displays, artisans,
dances, dancing, political meetings and rallies, an array of
performers, a locomotive ride, yachting and rowing races, vast picnic
areas, a deer park, horse racing, fishing, wrestling and boxing
matches, ploughing (lumberjack) contests, singing, a “buffalo” hunt,
fascinating oddities, and ethnic celebrations.
Stevens agreed to
rent out an area of
Elysian Fields to the
New York base ball
players for $75 per
year.
On September 26, 1845,
Cartwright organized a formal
ball club in order to collect fees
to cover the rent. The club was
called the Knickerbockers, in
honor of his fire company. On
behalf of the Knickerbockers,
Cartwright created formal rules
for playing the game and
gentlemanly behavior.
The Knickerbockers played on
weekends and practiced twice
a week on their new grounds.
Knickerbocker Rules
• Infield must be diamond-shaped with bases
at each of the four corners; bases were
located 90 feet from one another
• Tagging a runner replaced “soaking” or
“plugging,” a painful feature of rounders
• At-bat team limited to three outs
• Fielders could obtain outs by catching the
ball on the first bounce or in the air, throwing
to first base ahead of the runner, or tagging
the runner between bases
Other base ball clubs soon organized. They usually
consisted of enough members to comprise at least two
teams. The clubs initially played intra-club games, but interclub games were eventually played.
Like other voluntary associations, the Knickerbockers drew up
bylaws, elected officers, and held regular meetings. In the earliest
days of the sport, one became a club member by invitation only.
On June 19, 1846, the Knickerbockers' second team lost
23-1 to the New York Base Ball Club in the first official,
prearranged match between two clubs.
A base ball game at Elysian Fields, 1859.
In a post-game ceremony, the winning team
received the game ball as a prize, and the home
club usually provided the visitors with gala dinners
In 1858, the early
clubs formed the
National Association
of Base Ball Players,
which assumed
responsibility for
rulemaking and
attempted to
preserve the
fraternal character of
the sport.
This photograph, taken by Brooklyn photographer Charles H.
Williamson, depicts the Knickerbocker Base Ball Club and the
Excelsior Base Ball Club in one of the earliest known team photos
and perhaps the first image on a baseball field. It was taken on
September 3, 1859, at Elysian Fields, Hoboken, New Jersey.
Grand Match for the Championship at the Elysian Fields, Hoboken,
New Jersey,1865. This Currier and Ives painting is often
misidentified as portraying the Knickerbocker Base Ball Club of New
York in action in the 1840s. However, the portrayed clubs are the
Brooklyn Atlantics, at the bat, and the New York Mutuals in the field;
the date of the match is August 3, 1865.
1865 Brooklyn Atlantics, 1865
When the Civil War erupted in 1861, there
were more than 600 clubs in more than 100
cities. The war encouraged the introduction of
base ball to hamlets across the nation.
Gettysburg, 1864
The “national game”
• 1850s was the decade that spawned the
nativist, anti-Catholic Know Nothing political
movement, as well as the bitter sectional
rivalries that culminated in the Civil War
• Yearnings for national unity spilled over into
the sports arena
• Many of the first baseball clubs openly
avowed their nationalism with names such as
Young America, Columbia, Union, Eagle,
American, National and Liberty
In 1857, Porter’s Spirit
declared that Americans
should have “a game that
could be termed a Native
American Sport.”
Baseball, its supporters
agreed, filled the need, for
it had evolved as a
distinctive American sport
and embodied the fastpace nature of American
life
The press helped to promote baseball. Porter’s
Spirit of the Times and the New York Clipper not
only reported results but also lent direct aid to
young men interested in forming clubs.
No single journalist
gave the sport greater
assistance than Henry
Chadwick, who edited
baseball’s annual
guidebook (circulation
of 65,000) and
invented the box score
and batting averages,
which enhanced the
appeal of the sport
Baseball as a Commercial Enterprise
• By 1860, charging admission to games had
become commonplace
• Gate receipts used to pay star players
• Fraternal bonds weakened; the post-game
rituals of awarding the game ball to the
winning team and hosting a dinner for the
visitors had disappeared from the sport
• Fans cheered for their heroes, heckled
umpires and opposing players, and
sometimes rioted
1869 Forst City Club, Cleveland OH
The formation of the Cincinnati Red Stockings in 1869 as
the first avowedly all-professional team ended the
pretense of baseball’s pristine amateurism
Led by Harry Wright, the Red
Stockings recruited five
eastern stars and swept
through the 1869 season of
58 games without a loss and
only one tie. Over 23,000
fans watched their six-game
series in New York. In
September, the club crossed
the US on the newly
completed transcontinental
railroad to play a series of
games in California
NAPBBP, 1871-1875
• The success of the Red Stockings encouraged the
formation of the first all-professional league, the
National Association of Professional Base Ball Players
• Team entry fee of $10
• Many teams in smaller cities joined but quickly dropped
out
• Teams scheduled their own games
• Players were free to move from one club to another at
the end of each season
• Some players enjoyed salaries two or three times
higher than the ordinary workingmen of the era
National League poster, 1874
Harry Wright’s Boston Red Sox dominated the new league
(Wright brought most of his Cincinnati team with him to
Boston). After losing the pennant to Philadelphia in 1871, the
Red Sox then won the next four consecutive championships.
In 1876 a few men, led by coal
baron William A. Hulbert –
president of the Chicago club –
conspired to overthrow the national
association and found a new
professional league that would be
profitable to investors. After
secretly obtaining the support of the
western clubs that resented the
eastern domination of the NAPBBP,
Hulbert called a meeting with
representatives of five eastern
clubs. After reviewing the
weaknesses of the association, he
proposed The National League of
Professional Base Ball Clubs.
The National League
• Charter members included Boston,
Chicago, Cincinnati, Louisville, Hartford,
St. Louis, Philadelphia, and New York
• Gave owners complete control of the
management, regulations, and the
resolution of disputes
• To appeal to Victorian sensibilities, it
forbade Sunday games and betting in ball
parks
The National League
• Pioneered a business structure that would
become standard for all 20th century
professional team sports
• Forbid negotiations with players from another
team while season was in progress
• In 1879, the owners secretly agreed to
“reserve” five players
• Prohibited the planting of more than one
franchise in each city
The National League
• Established an entry monopoly
• Two blackballs by existing franchises
barred new applicants from the league
• In order for an aspiring baseball owner to
obtain a league franchise, he had to win
the votes of the owners of existing clubs,
purchase an existing club, or … form a
competing major league
For its first six years,
Hulbert offered the National
League strong – albeit
sometimes questionable –
leadership. His highhanded
and dictatorial methods
improved the image of
professional baseball, but
when he died the league
directors made certain that
none of his successors
obtained similar powers.
Hulbert’s decisions
• Hulbert mandated the charging of a uniform
admission price of 50 cents for all games
(when daily wages were one to three dollars)
• In 1876 (first year of the league), he expelled
New York and Philadelphia for failing to make
their final road tours
• In 1877, he expelled four Louisville players
for taking bribes from gamblers
• In 1880, he expelled Cincinnati for its
insistence on selling beer at its park and
renting its park out on Sundays
The expulsion of Cincinnati led to a direct
challenge to the National League
American Association
of Base Ball Clubs
• In 1881, Cincinnati called together delegates from
cities that had been excluded from the league
• Charter franchises were located in Baltimore,
Cincinnati, Louisville, Philadelphia, Pittsburgh and
St. Louis
• Dubbed the “Beer Ball League” since four of the six
directors owned breweries
• Charged 25 cents admission, sold liquor at games,
and allowed Sunday games
• Invited National League players to join
National Agreement
• The success of the American Association
cause the leaderless National League to call
for a surrender in 1882 (Hulbert had died in
April, 1882)
• The presidents of the two leagues, plus the
head of the Northwestern League (MI, OH,
IL) signed an agreement
• At the heart of the agreement was the mutual
recognition of reserved players and the
establishment of exclusive territorial rights
1880s Baseball
• Booming US economy resulted in increased
attendance at baseball games
• Informal post-season series between the two
leagues also increased interest
• St. Louis Browns won four American Association
pennants and two “World Series” from National
League opponents
• Clubs made profits, but competition for player
talent drove up salaries
• Clubs in both leagues violated the spirit of the
1882 National Agreement
1889 St. Louis Browns, managed by Charles Comiskey,
who would later own the Chicago White Sox
Demise of the American Association
• American Association club owners, especially Brooklyn
and St. Louis, fought for management of the league
• When the American Association chose a puppet of the
St. Louis Browns as president in 1890, Brooklyn and
Cincinnati resigned and joined the National League
• The National League ignored the National Agreement,
indicating that it was prepared to resume an all-out war
with the Association
• Attendance at Association games dropped drastically
• At the end of 1891, the Association surrendered
• The National League then absorbed four Association
clubs, making it a twelve-member league, and bought
out the other four clubs
The Players’ Revolt
• Owners devised ingenious methods of keeping
players’ salaries at a minimum
• From its founding in 1876, the National League
employed the dreaded “blacklist” – once a
player had been dismissed by a club or the
league, no other club could negotiate with him
• In the 1880s, club owners agreed on uniform
salary limits
• The backbone of owner control was the
reserve clause in player contracts
The Reserve Clause
• The club that first signed a player had a
lifetime option on that player’s services
• During negotiations, a player had only two
options: refuse to play until he received his
requested salary, or quit playing the game
• The reserve clause also made it possible
to buy and sell players
• These measures triggered a players’ revolt
in the mid-1880s
John Montgomery Ward, a
player and a lawyer,
founded the Brotherhood of
Professional Base Ball
Players in 1885. When the
league set a $2500 ceiling
on all players in 1887, Ward
presented the league with
an ultimatum: abandon the
salary limit and stop selling
players, or a new league
would be formed in 1890.
The league ignored his
threats.
Ward formed the Players’
National League of Professional
Base Ball in 1890. The players
challenged the National League
directly by invading seven of its
cities with new franchises and
lured most of its players away
from the senior loop. The
Players’ League obtained
enough financial backing to be
initially successful. In a novel
departure from the traditions of
private enterprise, the players
and investors assumed joint
management of the new
enterprise.
The National League
appointed Albert Spalding
to suppress the player
uprising. He denounced
the players as “hot-headed
anarchists” who were
typical of “revolutionary
movements.” The courts
held that the contracts
containing reserve clauses
lacked equity, thereby
permitting the players to
jump to the new circuit with
impunity.
The Players’ League
• Only survived one season
• Competing in the same cities on the same days,
both leagues gave away free tickets
• The richer owners in the National League could
withstand the financial sacrifices more easily
than could the Players’ League investors
• Some of the investors withdrew support and
some players went back to the National League
• After one season, the experiment in
cooperative-capitalistic baseball ended in failure