With the birthday of our great country celebrated this past Monday, we look back at some of the America’s greatest gifts to the world. Creations such as Rock n’ Roll, Hollywood Movies, Internet and the Telephone have highlighted the American contribution to worldwide life. Although, there is one that tops all.
The Game of Baseball.
The history of baseball is an odd and confusing road. There are a couple different variations on who created the game, the origins of the game, and when it became an official sport. The most well-known tale of Baseball is of course Abner Doubleday starting the game in 1839 here in America. Doubleday, a cadet at West Point at the time, is widely credited as the inventor of baseball when he started the first game ever played. The game was played in Cooperstown, New York, now the home of the Major League Baseball Hall of Fame. To this date, the MLB and the HOF still acknowledge that Doubleday created the game.
Others though, believe there is another story to the game. According to History.com, the first-time organized baseball was seen in September of 1845. The article states, “a group of New York City men founded the New York Knickerbocker Baseball Club.” In this story, it is a man of the name Alexander Joy Cartwright that is credited with the birth of our pastime. Cartwright and company claim to have created baseball off inspiration from “rounders”, an old colonist game, and the sport of cricket. The story is that Cartwright was the one who created the rules we know of baseball today. The shape of the field, the limits of foul lines, and the number of strikes allowed per batter. In 1846 Cartwright and the Knickerbocker Baseball Club were said to play the first game of American baseball when they took on a team of cricket players.
The emergence of baseball as a traditional American sport is not the clearest story. There is still a decent amount of disagreement, even if Doubleday is credited by the MLB Hall of Fame. None the less, the sport grew in popularity and by 1869 we saw our first professional team in the Cincinnati Red Stockings. By 1876 we had the National League of Professional Baseball Clubs (modern day National League) created by William Hulbert, a wealthy Chicago businessman. The league held eight teams that include modern day Atlanta Braves and Chicago Cubs. In 1901 the league we know as the American League today was founded and by 1903, we had cross league play for the World Series Title.
SC.com Blog Dog:
-Tucker, a Military Brat pup hailing from Connecticut, loves going for relaxing walks, ear rubs, scratching rugs, and eating entire bowls of chicken enchilada meat before his family can eat it! A HUGE fan of the Yankees, Giants and most things New York (with the exception of a borderline-unhealthy obsession with LeBron James), TuckTuck is so excited to get to blog about his favorite thing – SPORTS, especially baseball.
