Baseball's Influence on a Growing America
...ultural element, baseball the sport developed from and into various forms before becoming what it is know as today. Particular applications of baseball history mirror and reflect more global and larger current affairs of American social and cultural history, making baseball as much of a cultural institution as politics, economics and the American life-style. At the time America was forming through the tribulation of the Industrial Revolution and the Civil War into the state it is today as a unified country, baseball was also developing into the game and cultural institution we know of as “America’s Pastime”. Baseball posses an American quality of uniqueness that has always been believed to be a result of a divine invention of a game created by Abner Doubleday in the summer of 1839. The fact an entire nation believes this sport appeared out of the clear blue American sky next to the amber waves of grain and purple mountain majesty, draws a sense of nationalism and pride to all aspects of the became because Americans felt it was solely created by an American and America did not owe credit to any other nation for its invention. In all reality there were various forms of baseball in several places across the country, which formulated their rules, regulations and the actual playing of the game from a collection of sports, including cricket and refined the English and the early American colonies versions and “invented” American baseball. The earliest recording of the presence of a form of influence to baseball in America was recorded in George Ewing’s journal in April of 1778. Ewing was a solider in George Washington’s army at Valley Forge and in his journal he noted the playing of a game called “base”. This game was a variation of an old English game called rounders, which later influenced games in England such as “town ball” and “old cat” which a number of players hit a ball with a stick and ran from base to base. The number of players and bases could be decided at the time of the game and there were not rules stating a certain number had to be used or could not be used. Baseball did not have a revolutionary metamorphosis toward its modern day form until more than sixty years after Ewing’s recording. In the 1840s, mainly in the northeast section of the United States, baseball began its continuous evolution. English sporting influence was the strongest in this portion of the country, which was rapidly becoming modernized with affordable transportation and public education. The cities were growing uncontrollably and smaller cities and towns experienced up to a ninety percent population increase with in the decade. Baseball became a leisurely pursuit for many of the hardworking, middle-class clerks, manufactures and skilled craftsmen dwelling in America’s cities looking for an organized outlet for their need to burn off some steam. Middle America was becoming more interested in creating an atmosphere of a club type lifestyle that was until the 1860s only possible for the wealthy upper-class cricket playing Americans. In 1868 the American Chronicle of Sports and Pastimes stated, “Baseball had changed more in ten years than cricket had in four hundred, and in doing so had adopted to its American circumstances.” Baseball was viewed as a scientific equivalent of cricket in that the players needed to execute mental powers of judgment, calculation and precision. America had been founded on English values and the English believed that leading a dormant and sedentary life promoted bad habits and sin, and were adamant supporters of physical outdoor activities and sports. In turn, Americans too wanted to immerse themselves in the values of outdoor exercise. Not only was baseball viewed as a positive way to use free time but also the social aspect was attractive to Americans. In the late half of the nineteenth century baseball clubs and organizations were popping up like wildflowers across America. The fact that the only equipment needed to participate in the game was a bat, a ball and an open area of grass or even concrete attracted the working class. Baseball was soon taking on individual forms from Philadelphia to New England; from primitive informal pick up games to formal sophisticated club formations. In whatever form, baseball was becoming extremely popular and the majority of its participants were from the working-class. During the period of American history in which baseball was emerging as the nation’s favorite sport, the populated urban areas such as Philadelphia, New York and Boston were growing into their own identities as American cities and were creating their own forms of baseball with local flare and autonomy. Home plate in the Philadelphia’s version of the game was an iron plate placed at the bottom of a diamond-shaped field were a batter would be withdrawn from the game if he was tagged out or the ball was thrown to the “base” or corner of the diamond a head of him. In Massachusetts, ten to fourteen played defensive positions on a rectangular field while there were bases located sixty feet apart on the corners. It was a volunteer firefighter from New York named Alexander Cartwright who wrote up the first set of rules for his baseball club back in 1845. Cartwright’s version used the Philadelphia diamond-shaped field template and positioned a pitcher, also known as a bowler, forty-five feet from the batter. Cartwright set canvas bag bases ninety feet apart and used round iron discs for home plate and the marking of the pitcher’s plate. He was also the originator of the nine-man field roster having the players in the same positions as modern day baseball, except for the shortstop, who back then acted as a true utility infielder moving about the interior of the field. At this time the pitcher was the catalyst to put the ball into play, they were not concerned about striking batters out, they were just there to lob the ball over home plate because the batter was out if the ball was caught in mid air, off one bounce or if the fielder threw the ball to the base before the runner reached it. Cartwright also began the 3 out ½ inning we have today but the game ended when one team scored twenty-one runs, the actual concept of an inning was not in existence yet. The “New York game” as it was quickly becoming known as around the North and the East symbolized the escalating authority and control of New York City itself as the premier model and leading city in the United States. New York City’s population out grew Philadelphia by one-third by 1850 and was centered on a main railroad hub and had the largest port traffic in America. The other contributing factor to the success of the New York version of the game was its simplicity. The game was easy to learn and rules were relatively easy to access. Cartwright left the New York area in 1849 to travel west and try his luck at the Gold Rush. On his journey across the Plains, he...