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ExaminerThe SABR UK

The Journal of the Bobby Thomson Chapter of the Society for American Baseball Research, Incorporatingthe Newsletter of the Baseball in UK/Europe Committee

www.sabr.org.uk

Autumn 2003

Number 13

Baseball’s Earliest Reference?

I’ve always thought that SABRmembers in the U.K. wereuniquely placed to investigatethe origins of the game we callbaseball, because we live inthe land that most probablynurtured the early games thatgave birth to baseball. Forinstance, I’ve always beeninterested in Robert W.Henderson’s account of theearliest known baseballreference.

Robert W. Henderson is theFather of Baseball Genealogy.In his seminal 1947 book,Ball, Bat and Bishop: The

Origin of Ball Games, hewrites:

“The earliest mention of a

game called baseball so far

located was made by the

Reverend Thomas Wilson, a

Puritan divine at Maidstone,

England. He wrote

reminiscently in the year

1700, describing events that

had taken place before that

time, perhaps during his

former years as a minister. ‘I

have seen’, he records with

disapproval, ‘Morris-dancing,

cudgel-playing, baseball and

cricketts, and many other sports

on the Lord’s Day.’”

This reference has been acceptedand repeated many times over. Butto me, something never seemedquite right about it, for a few rea-

sons:1. I have never seen the word‘divine’ used as a noun.2. I know there is a 1 in 100chance that an event will take placein a year ending in 00, but it justseemed to me to be an estimate, a

‘circa’ date.3. I wouldn’t expect such anearly reference to use the term“baseball”. I would expect either“base ball” or “base-ball”.4. There is no hint regarding thesource of the quote, whether a

book, personal letter, etc. Unfortu-nately this is a general failing ofHenderson’s usually impeccableresearch.5. According to my knowledge ofBritish history, the Puritans were aspent force after the Restoration(1661), after twelve years of thetheocracy of Cromwell and theRoundheads. I can’t imaginesomeone claiming to be a Puritanin 1700, at least openly.

A further clue was discoveredwhen I was researching stoolball,and was going through the papersof Major Grantham, stoolball’stwentieth-century re-inventor, inLewes in Sussex. I came across acopy of the Sussex County Maga-zine for July 1928, which con-tained the article “Stoolball inSussex” by M.S. Russell-Goggs. Itcontains a series of early refer-ences to stoolball, including thisone:

“About 1630 a Puritan records that

‘Maidstone was formerly a very

profane town, where stool-ball and

other games were practised on the

Lord’s Day’.”

This really got my interest, be-cause it seemed very similar to theThomas Wilson comment, quotedby Henderson. But it gives a muchearlier date than Henderson, andbaseball is not one of the gamesmentioned. Still, 1630 is a muchmore reasonable date for a Puritan

minister; in fact, that was the yearthe Puritans founded the Americancity of Boston.

So I was more puzzled than ever,but I didn’t know exactly where tostart to track down the exact quote.

by Martin Hoerchner

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So I let it simmer for years, butthen, last week, in a sudden burstof inspiration, I vowed to try to solvethe mystery. After all, Maidstoneisn’t far from me, about 20 minutesby car. I pictured myself discoveringthe quote on a yellowed letter in adark cobwebbed corner of the KentCounty Historical Society Head-quarters.

Maidstone, in fact, is the CountyTown of Kent (where I live), so it’sequivalent to a U.S. state capital.It’s a busy town of 140,000 people,about 20 miles southwest of Lon-don. At least I think it’s a town. InBritain cities and towns are officialdesignations; for instance, a cityhas to have a cathedral to be a city.Cityships are of high status and arehanded out like prizes on theQueen’s Jubilee years. Maidstonesits on the River Medway, whichsnakes right through the centre oftown. Despite its proximity, Ihaven’t spent much time there,probably due the lack of parkingspaces. It’s got a jumble of bridgesand roundabouts in the middle oftown, with a hundred signs whiz-zing around; the kind of traffic mazewhere you have to know what laneyou want to be in about six turns inadvance. My fondest memory ofMaidstone is driving through it onceduring a summer festival, which Ilater found out was an annual eventcalled the River Festival. The streetswere full of people, the river was fullof brightly-decorated party boats,makeshift barbecues served food allover, and the sound of music waseverywhere. And yes, it was on aSunday.

I was at a loss as to where to startto find the quote, becauseHenderson didn’t give a clue to thesource of the quote. So to start, Ientered “Thomas Wilson” andMaidstone in Google, and to mysurprise got quite a few hits! I feltguilty doing research by Internet,but salved my consciousness bytelling myself it was only a pointerto finding the original document,and seeing for myself the wording.

The first reference that caught myattention was from the CanterburyChrist Church University CollegeBookshop. To my great joy I found awrite-up of a book that they carried,written by Jacqueline Eales, aReader in early modern history atthe University. The book was

entitled “Community and Disunity –Kent and the English Civil Wars,1640-1649”. It was a collection offour different lectures, numberthree of which was entitled “ThomasWilson and the ‘Prophane Town’ ofMaidstone”. So there was a wholechapter based on the quote! And mysuspicion was reinforced of anearlier date. I phoned the bookshopimmediately to see if they had thebook in stock so I could drive toCanterbury to pick it up that day (Ilove visiting Canterbury, if you canovercome – yes – the lack of parkingspaces). But it was a Bank Holiday,and the shop was closed. So Icontacted them the next day andordered the book, which was not instock, and I eagerly await its arrival.

Back to the Internet, the secondreference that grabbed me was on awebsite about “the 1911 Encyclo-paedia”, which was a really excel-lent reference site and taken verba-tim from the 1911 EncyclopaediaBritannica. The listing was for‘Cricket’ and it ran into screenfuls,very exhaustive and complete. Thesection of interest was at thebeginning, where, like the stoolballarticle, they ran a catalogue of earlyreferences to the sport. One of theearlier references was this:

In The Life of Thomas Wilson, Minis-

ter of Maidstone, published anony-

mously in I672, Wilson. having been

born in 1601 and dying in or about

1653, occurs the following passage

(p. 40): “Maidstone was formerly avery profane town, in as much as Ihave seen morrice-dancing, cudgel-playing, stool-ball, crickets, andmany other sports openly andpublicly indulged in on the Lord’sDay.”

That was really a Eureka moment!This reference gave the source I’dalways wanted. If it wasHenderson’s baseball quote, itwould set the date of the earliestbaseball reference back at least 28years, and maybe even 47 years,and maybe even more. The quotewas taken from a book aboutThomas Wilson, published in 1672.I was thrilled to discover it was in abook, because I could possibly seeit in the British Library. Now I evenknew on which page the quote was.

So I immediately went to the BritishLibrary website – sorry, doingresearch on the web again. You can

search their catalogue, and I hopedagainst hope, and bingo! It wasthere. The title of the book wasgiven as “The life and death of Mr.Tho. Wilson, Minister of Maidstone,etc.” It was indeed dated 1672, andran 99 pages. The book had noauthor but there was a commentthat the preface is signed G.S., i.e.George Swinnock. I immediatelyordered the book for my perusal intwo days’ time.

From the moment I first got the ideato check the Internet for the quotetill I found the British Librarycatalogue listing for the book, tookabout a half-hour.

So I had two days to mull thingsover. One of the first things thatcame to me was that the 1911cricket quote didn’t mention base-ball either. It was stool-ball whereHenderson had baseball. Thistallied with the stoolball article,which mentioned stoolball “andother sports”. I was at odds as tohow to reconcile these discrepan-cies. Unless… there are SABR UKmembers, sometimes including me,who believe, in one form or another,that there has been a certain levelof suppression of baseball in thiscountry, including suppression ofbaseball’s importance in the historyof sport, because they wanted todiminish its importance to giveprecedence to British sports. Itsmacks a bit of paranoia, con-spiracy theories, etc, but I honestlythought that it was the most likelyexplanation for the difference in thequotes. Seeing the source will revealall.

I had this fantasy of coming acrossthe baseball reference on page 40,and running my fingers over theword, and proving all the conspiracytheories. I would feel like HowardCarter opening Tutanhamen’s tomb– I would be the first person inhistory ever to specifically searchfor an original baseball referenceand find it in a source that can bedefinitely dated to a year in the1600’s.

When I got to the library, theyhanded me the book, which wasvery small – it was 3” x 5 ½ “ - andfit in the palm of my hand. I hurriedto my desk and hurried to page 40,and this is how it read (preservingthe original spelling):

Baseball’s Earliest Reference? (con’t)

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“Chap. XVIIIThe Reformation which waswrought by his means and Minis-try in Maidstone.

“Maidstone was formerly a very

prophane Town, insomuch that I

have seen Morrice dancing, Cudgel

playing, Stool-ball, Crickets, and

many other sports openly and

publickly on the Lords Day; I have

heard them jeer, and deride and

mock at those who professed Godli-

ness and went to hear a Sermon on

the Lords Day abroad, when

they had none at home.”

It mentioned stoolball, notbaseball. King Tut’s tombcollapsed around me, and mychance at baseball historyimmortality vanished in a puffof dust. Sic transit gloria mundi,as I always say (actually, I’venever said it). After the realisa-tion that life doesn’t alwaysmeet your expectations sank in,I started to look deeper into thebook.

It is a short book, more like ahardcover booklet. It tells Rev.Wilson’s life story, and theunnamed writer of the book isfull of praise of the late Rever-end. He must have been aremarkable character, becausethe book was published about19 years after his death! Tho-mas Wilson was born inCumberland, and after hestarted his ministry was trans-ferred a few times, finallycoming to Maidstone. The bookisn’t strong on exact dates.

There is a handwritten note onthe inside cover, “by GeorgeSwinnock”. I don’t knowwhether this applied to the wholebook or only to the preface (as theBritish Library public cataloguelisting stated). George Swinnockcertainly is a likely candidate to bethe author of the book. His nameappears in the text of the biography,mentioned as Rev. Wilson’s patron.I looked his name up – yes, on theInternet – and came up with manyreferences, including a five-volumeset of his writings currently in print!The publisher of the set said thatSwinnock was among the mostreadable of the Puritan writers.

An interesting point is that the“prophane Town” quote is not

presented as a quote from Rev.Wilson. The book glided along fromthe start in the third person talkingabout Rev. Wilson, and at thebeginning of Chapter 18, it switchesto the first person in enunciation ofthe former sins of profane Maid-stone. It looks very much like thesewere the observations of the author,not Rev. Wilson’s. Most likely theyare George Swinnock’s. The thrustof that chapter was that Rev.Wilson made Maidstone a lessprofane place because of his minis-

try, so Swinnock sets the scene bytelling how worldly Maidstone wasbefore Rev. Wilson’s arrival.

As for the sports mentioned, I can’texplain what cudgel playing is. Itmust be some sort of mock fight,because a cudgel is a weapon. Foranyone living outside these fairisles, an explanation of Morrisdancing would be in order. It stillexists and is quite popular in somerural places. It is a form of ancientfolk dance, done in a group ofdancers with very traditional outfits,to me a bit reminiscent of Bavariansand Tyroleans with their

lederhosen, and with a string ofsmall bells around their ankles. It’sthe kind of hobby that comediansfind tremendously humorous (read:geek factor), but others are gener-ally fascinated and appreciativewith the link to a much simplerpast. When I’ve ever come acrossMorris dancers, I always stop andwatch for as long as I can.

I needed to address the bottom line,why is the Henderson quote differ-ent from the Wilson book? Why

does Henderson say baseballwhen the book says stoolball?

What is really puzzling is thatthe Henderson section is wrongon almost every level. Theoriginal mentions stoolball, notbaseball, The date is 1672, not1700. It is not Rev. Wilson’smemoirs, it is his posthumousbiography. And the quote aboutMaidstone was not Rev. Wil-son’s, but by the author of thebiography.

How could this happen? I cancome up with three possibilities:1. Maybe the book exists inanother edition, dated 1700,which mentions baseballinstead of stoolball.2. Maybe there is anothersimilar quote either by ThomasWilson or George Swinnockwhich mentions baseballinstead of stoolball.3. Henderson got the quotesecond or even third hand. Ihave in mind an Americanacademic, coming across thestoolball reference, and sayingto him/her-self, “Stoolball…that’s what they called baseballin 17th century Britain, isn’t it?”I’d like to trace Henderson’soriginal source for the quote.

The third option certainly seems themost plausible, but we may neverknow. I still have a few more pathsto tread in my search to clear upthis mystery. I’ll see whatJacqueline Eales’ chapter on “theprofane town of Maidstone” willbring. I’ll write her to see if sheknows anything more. If I have to,I’ll buy the five-volume Swinnockset to see if I can find a variation ofthe Maidstone quote, maybe onementioning baseball.

I’d like to find an answer. I don’tlike being puzzled.

Baseball’s Earliest Reference? (con’t)

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by Jim Combs

Henderson’s Historical Method

Mr. Robert W. Henderson’s workentitled Ball, Bat and Bishop: The

Origin of Ball Games is rightlyregarded as an important work forhistorians of baseball, tennis andindeed many other ball games. Inhis introduction to Ball, Bat and

Bishop, Mr. Will Irwin writes:

“the early critics of the Doubleday

tradition base their scepticism mostly

on observation and common sense.

What they lacked was a thorough

investigation undertaken in the

scientific spirit. Mr. Henderson has

supplied that.”

Whether or not Mr. Irwin’s accoladeis deserved is not the subject of thisshort piece. I have quoted Mr. Irwin,however, to note that Mr.Henderson’s place in thehistory of ball games –not just baseball- isgenerally regarded asimportant. Indeed, mycolleagues and I in theBobby Thomson Chapterof SABR UK here in theUK generally regard Ball,

Bat and Bishop as theauthoritative source asto the origins of ball andbat games. I suspect thatour view is shapedmainly by the expansive-ness of the work, whichranges from Egyptiantimes to the present replete withreferences and pictures. For exam-ple, when Mr. Henderson quotesJusserand’s description of the gameLa Soule on p.39 of Ball, Bat and

Bishop we assume that the quote isaccurate and that Jusserand’sdescription is based on convincingevidence. None of us has to myknowledge began a painstakinganalysis of Mr. Henderson’s workwhich would, I submit, be quite adaunting task since he does notfootnote his quotations.

JEU DE BOULES TAPESTRY ANDTHE STORY OF GOMBAUT ANDMACEE

An opportunity to verify one of thefacts in Ball, Bat and Bishop pre-sented itself to me fortuitouslywhen the Chairman of our Chapter,Mr. Mike Ross, gave me a picture ofa tapestry on display in New YorkCity’s Metropolitan Museum of Art.

Mike had noted that the tapestryshowed a group of young personsplaying some sort of ballgame. Heasked me to translate the inscrip-tions. (Not unlike a modern daycomic strip, each of the personshad their remarks set forth in acloud shaped circle in close proxim-ity to their heads.) The medievalfrench proved too difficult for myselfand my French friends, so I wrote tothe Metropolitan Museum andreceived in return a very helpfulletter complete with an extract froma work by Edith Appleton Standenentitled European Post-Medieval

Tapestries and Related Hangings in

the Metropolitan Museum of Art

(hereinafter referred to as “MetTapestries Work.”) Prompted by thisarticle, I began a search of theBritish Library’s works on tapestriesto see if I could find any similar

tapestries. Eventually, I discoveredthat the tapestry seen by Mike Rosswas indeed the same subject as thetapestry, which appeared in Ball,

Bat and Bishop. Here at last was achance to analyze the accuracy ofone small part of Mr. Henderson’sseminal work.

GROUND BILLIARDS (BILLIARDSDE TERRE)

Opposite p.133 of Ball, Bat and

Bishop is an illustration which Mr.Henderson calls Ground Billiards,France, 1460 (From St. Lô tapestry,in J.M.J. Guiffrey, Les Amours de

Gombaut et de Macee, Paris, 1882)This tapestry is quite similar to theone that Mike Ross saw in theMetropolitan Museum. A compari-son of Ms. Standen’s discussion ofthese tapestries with that of Mr.Henderson should afford us achance of determining whetherHenderson’s conclusions drawn

from the tapestry are consistentwith those of a noted scholar ontapestries.

Henderson states on p.121 of Ball,

Bat and Bishop that billiards, likehockey, football, and tennis “ . . . isa direct descendant of the old

Egyptian fertility rites, a close

relative of the other games.” Accord-ing to Henderson, the source ofboth croquet and billiards (throughthe game of jeu de boules) is a gameof jeu de mail. On p.114 Hendersondescribes jeu de mail as a gamewhich developed in southern Franceduring the 14th century. It was, hecontinues, on p.114 a game inwhich “...two sides strove to drive a

ball to a given mark in the least

number of strokes. ... The boxwood

ball, about the size of a lawn tennis

ball, was driven with a mallet, a

stick with a wooden head.“(p.114) On p. 115 Hendersonwrites that in England “Just

as la soule had been reduced

to ground billiards, so pall

mall (the name of jeu de mail

in England) was played on a

definite ’ground’ and the ball

had to be driven through an

iron ring suspended in the air.

The earliest rules of jeu de

mail were published in Paris

by Joseph Lauthier in 1717,

some forty years before the

earliest rules of golf.”

Returning to Henderson’sdiscussion of billiards, I note

that on p. 121 of Ball, Bat and

Bishop Henderson mentions afamous French tapestry known as“Les Amours de Gombaut et deMacee” which was made in about1460 and was first inventoried atSt. Lô in 1532. On pp.21-2 of Ball,

Bat and Bishop Henderson writes

“This tapestry portrayed scenes

around the country-side at St. Lô,

two of which show a game called jeu

de boules or de tiquet. A small

ground is enclosed in a low wattle

fence. Within the enclosure, at some

distance from each other, appear an

arch, or low hoop, later called a

”port”, and a small cone-shaped

marker, later called a ‘king’. Three

players and three balls indicate that

each played his own ball, and each

player carries a mace, or cure, which

appears to be a long wooden stick

with a spade-shaped, slightly curved

end.”

5“.... Jeu de boules is none other than

the link between jeu de mail, as

played on the ground, and the

modern game of billiards, played on

a table. The game was also called

billard de terre, or ground billiards, a

name which indicates a definite

relationship. One other feature of this

fifteenth century game justifies the

claim that it was an ancestor of

billiards: the ball could be caromed

off the sides of the enclosure, which

were commonly made of planks of

wood.”

Henderson concludes his case onpp.121-2 by stating that the nextstep was to put this game on atable. He notes that some claimthat this was done by Henrique deVigne in about the year 1571 forHenry III for his summer palace inBlois, but that this claim is not toowell substantiated. On p.122Henderson notes that as late as1674, in a portrait of Louis XIVplaying billiards, there is still a portand a king with no change in themace. “By 1700 the port and king

had disappeared and by 1734 the

modern cue began to displace the

spade-shaped mace. The earliest

rules of billiards known to us today

appeared in Cotton’s Compleat

Gamester which was published in

1674.”

Edith Standen’s work discusses thevarious versions of the “Jeu deBoules” tapestries and confirms asHenderson claims that the Jeu deBoules tapestry was indeed afamiliar one in France and the LowCountries. Ms. Standen also givesus more information about thesubject. She mentions that thegame is being played by teenageboys and girls of presumablyhumble origin and that the dialogclearly indicates that the game ispart of the courtship rituals, since itis played between boys and girlsand the language is quite sugges-tive. For example, the remarks inthe last scroll translate as followsaccording to the Met TapestriesWork of Ms. Standen:

“Gombaut, thy hand is too free, and

then it is not good manners to smack

the behind of a girl without promising

to marry her.”

DATING THE JEU DE BOULESTAPESTRIES

Ms. Standen attributes the versionof Jeu de Boules which is hangingin New York’s Metropolitan Museumto Bruges and on stylistic grounds

assigns it a date of 1600.Henderson assigns the date ofabout 1460 to the version of Jeu deBoules hanging in St. Lô and statesthat it was first inventoried in 1532.On the otherhand, Ms Standen infootnote number 13 of her workstates that “none of the existing

pieces can be assigned to so early a

date (as 1532).” As authority for thisproposition, Ms. Standen citesGuiffrey (Amours, p.14.) This issomewhat surprising sinceHenderson has also most probablyrelied upon Guiffrey, Amours for hisdate of 1460 although one cannotbe sure because Henderson doesnot footnote. Thus, according toStanden, Henderson’s date isprobably about 100 years too soon.

GUIFFREY’S STORY OF THELOVES OF GOMBAUT AND MACEE

Somewhat surprisingly, a reading ofGuiffrey, Amours appears to supportHenderson. In referring to the St. LôTapestry Guiffrey writes on page 1of Amours:

“Evidement, l’execution de la

tapisserie remonte a une date

anterieure a l’inventaire de trente ou

quarante annees au moins. Ce

document souffirait a lui seul pour

faire attribuer a la fin du 15th siecle

l’invention du roman qui nous

occupe.”

“Clearly, the execution of the tapes-

try goes back to a date which is at

least 30 to 40 years prior to the

inventory. This document alone is

sufficient to attribute the invention of

the story (which is the basis for the

tapestries) to the end of the 15th

century.”

In his work (Amours) Guiffrey isseeking to date the story ofGombaut and Macee. He notes thatthis country tale was very popularin the 16th & 17th centuries. Indeed,it is averred to in Moliere’s Avare.

“Harpagon veut faire accepter pour

mille ecus a son client: ....; plus une

tenture de tapisserie des Amours de

Gombaut et Macee.”

Guiffrey also notes that the name ofGombaut was frequently in thepoetry of the 15th and 16th centuryand that Macee (the feminine formof Mathieu) was common in the 15th

and 16th centuries. (p.54 of Amours.)Guiffrey in the end conjectures thata poet named Henri Baude hadprobably popularized the story.

HENDERSON’S USE OF JEU DEBOULES VINDICATED

What do we make of Henderson’suse of the tapestry to illustrate thedevelopment of table billiards? Inbalance, he seems to have used thetapestry Jeu de Boules quite legiti-mately to support his conclusionthat, although table billiards wasclaimed by some to have beenplayed in 1571, this claim has notin fact been “too well substantiated”(p.122 Henderson.) It would per-haps have been better to attributethe tapestry to the second half ofthe 15th century than to refer to aparticular year (“about 1460”), butthis is only a quibble. He seems tohave dated the tapestry consistentlywith the information contained inhis source, Guiffrey’s work Les

Amours de Gombaut et Macee. Ms.Standen’s argument about thedating, if she is indeed includingthe St. Lô tapestries in what sherefers to as “existing tapestries,”would appear to put the tapestry ofSt. Lô at 1600. Even this date wouldnot cast significant doubt on thechronology which Henderson isadvancing for the development oftable billiards.

This brief attempt to assess theaccuracy of the scholarship em-ployed in the writing of Ball, Bat and

Bishop would not seem to call intoquestion Mr. Henderson’s researchmethods. Indeed, if the tapestry Jeude Boule is in fact 100 years olderthan he asserts, this is a mistakewhich was made by his source,J.M.J. Guiffrey in his Les Amours de

Gombaut et de Macee, Paris, 1882.Indeed, even if the 20th century finearts scholar, Edith AppletonStanden, has discovered a 100 yearmistake in Guiffrey’s dating of theSt. Lô tapestries, this mistake doesno serious damage to Mr.Henderson’s analysis of the emer-gence of the game of Table Billiardsnor to Henderson’s reputation forscholarship. Ms. Stanton appears tobe questioning the conclusions ofGuiffrey based upon her analysis ofvarious tapestries as being of a stylemuch later than 1532, because ofthe design and style of the St. Lôversion of Jeu de Boules.

CONCLUSION

Our first attempt to assess thescholarship of Henderson’s work,Ball, Bat and Bishop, suggests thatin this work Henderson is faithful tohis sources.

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The Dinosaur Hunters II :

I’ve written previously about how acoincidence helped me discover anancient bat and ball game previ-ously thought extinct. This storycan be seen as an adjunct to thestoolball story, but it has enoughinterest to stand on its own.

The stoolball story started when Ireceived a letter from a SABRmember in Japan, asking ifstoolball was still being played inEngland. I was ready to send back anegative answer. By coincidence Iwas working on a meeting report forthe latest AGM, and came to AllenSynge’s report, where he stated thatstoolball definitely wasbeing played, particu-larly in Sussex. Thisled to a trail of explo-ration through thesouth of England, insearch of informationon stoolball as it iscurrently played.Eventually my storywas printed in “TheNational Pastime”.

If the first storystarted with a coinci-dence, then thesecond story musttoo. Four years agomy wife and me wereblessed with our firstchild, a son. After that life becametoo busy, and SABR seemed a bitirrelevant. But time passes andJack has become very independentand life doesn’t 100% revolvearound him like it used to. It’s morelike only 85%, but that’s a bigdifference. So lately I’ve beenthinking about how to expand myhorizons, and a few weeks ago mywife is at work on Sunday, so I’mdriving around with my son, andonly a few miles from my home I seea sign “Bat and Trap fun day -Halstead”.

“Bat and trap” is the modern namefor trapball, a very old game playedin England since the Middle Ages. Itis definitely older than cricket, andprobably older than stoolball. TheCanterbury & District League tracedtrapball back to a monastery inCanterbury in the 1300’s; currentlyoccupying the grounds is “Ye OldeBeverlie” pub, which became one ofthe founding members of the

league. It is in the “Little PrettyPocket Book” of 1767 (and probablyearlier editions), right next to thefirst illustration of a game called“base ball”. By the time “The Boy’sOwn Book” was published in 1828,it was considered to rank next tocricket in popularity.

I’ve seen bat and trap being playedbefore, along with Mike Ross andAllen Synge, at the Black Lion pubin Gillingham before my life got socomplicated. Allen provided the leadthat the game was still beingplayed, just like he’d put us ontothe stoolball matches.

We learned that bat and trap was aKent game, and uniquely a pub

game, played in the beer gardenjust behind the pub. The monthwas May and the match started at 8p.m., so we watched them play indeclining sunlight, until the 2 100-watt lamps mounted in the coniferskicked in. We mused about howtrap ball and stoolball might belinked to cricket and baseball in thegrand scheme of things, but moreabout that later.

For the longest time none of thiswas important, but this sign I saw afew miles from my home drew mein. I knew Bat and Trap was a Kentgame, but what was it doing on mydoorstep? Of course I had to rushhome and get my camera and rushback to Halstead.

Being a small village, there was noparking, and I had to park milesaway. The event was held on aschool playing field, across from apub where no doubt bat and trap isplayed. I was with Jack, and he was

fascinated by the crowds and mix ofsights, sounds, and smells.

The first thing I saw was a hugebouncy castle, for the kids. Therewas an information desk on bat andtrap. There were a line of standswhere you could purchase snacks,hot sandwiches, or the occasionalbeer. But on the far field, in a linestretching 100-200 yards, was aseries of bat and trap pitches setup, one next to the other, and allfrantic with activity and the whiz-zing of balls right and left. Behindthe pitches was a row of seating forthe players, and behind that was alarge open area to mill about andwatch the action.

I was fascinated, like akid who had only readabout baseball comingacross all seven gamesof the World Serieshappening at once,foul-line to foul-line. Ifrantically took pic-tures while trying tokeep my third eye onJack. I bought him anice cream. At one pointI couldn’t find him andpanicked, until I foundhim chatting up a girl6 months youngerthan him.

I left after I found thatthey had run out of hot

dogs, but my appetite had beenwhetted. I felt I had to complete mytrapball story before the end ofseason, and it was approachingfast. So I hit the internet, and founda number of trapball websites – justenter “bat and trap” in any searchengine. I contacted the Canterbury& District Bat & Trap league, and Iwas put in touch with Peter Guise,the Press Officer for the League. Heinformed me that the season waspretty much over, but that therewas a makeup game due to takeplace in Whitstable in a few days.Great, I said, we’ll be there.

I arranged a journalistic expeditionwith Chapter Chairman Mike Ross.We set off from my home at 4.00 toavoid the rush, and it took about anhour to get there, down the M2through numerous roadworks thathave been going on since 1066.

Whitstable is a charming seasidetown which I’ve managed to miss in

by Martin Hoerchner

7

my seventeen years in Britain.Driving into the town you comedown from a hill and hit a spectacu-lar panorama with the town in theforeground and the sea consumingthe background. We found a carpark right next to the shinglebeach. A long line of land hung onthe horizon – I took my wife therethe next weekend and she said “Isthat France?” to which I replied “No,it’s Essex”. (Is this heaven? No, it’sIowa.) I’m not sure if it’s theThames Estuary or the North Sea,but it was pleasant and calmingwatching the boats on a sunny day.

We were early, so we were hungry,and Mike was out for the famousWhitstable oysters. Wesauntered down numer-ous alleys in search ofthe perfect meal. Many ofthe white wooden housesseemed distinctly NewEngland to me. Our onlyproblem was that it was5 minutes past highseason, and it was 5.30which is on the cuspbetween lunch anddinner. You may usedifferent terms for thenoon and the eveningmeals, but all the restau-rants we came acrosswere closed for the nexthour. The only place wecould find that actuallyserved food was a pubnot far from the harbour. Mikesampled the fish and chips, and mebeing an unrepentant Californian Ihad probably the only tacos avail-able in Whitstable. Not completelyaccurate, but tasty nonetheless.

Thus refreshed, we set out for thepub, which was named the FourHorseshoes. It was easily found,and I squeezed the car into a tightparking space next to the pub. Aswe parked Mike said “Let’s be low-key about this; I don’t want toattract too much attention”, but theminute we got inside the pub, hestarted telling everyone that we hadjust flown in from the States towatch this game! I was confused.Then I tried to pass myself off as a“Kentish Man”, but I’d only lived inKent for 8 years, and part of the“London Borough of Bromley” atthat. But I tried.

But after that shaky start, wequickly engaged the locals in

conversation, and it turned outmost of them were there to play batand trap. The first thing we foundout about Whitstable was that PeterCushing lived there before he methis fate in the Death Star.

But the Force was with us, and wesoon had a player volunteer toexplain the game to us. His namewas Kevin, and he took us to anadjoining room overlooking thegame pitch. Bat and trap is playedon a rectangular pitch, long andnarrow, measuring 63 feet by 13 1/2 feet. What makes Bat and Trapunique is of course the trap, whichis a wood and metal device. Thebatsman hits the trap with his bat

and the ball pops up, fungo-style,and the batsman hits the balltowards the narrow end of thepitch. If the ball goes right or leftbefore then, the batsman is out. Onthe far end of the pitch, the eightmembers of the opposing teamstand, ready to field the ball. If theball is caught on the fly the bats-man is out. Besides that, how theyfield the ball really doesn’t matter.What matters is how the bowlerreturns the ball. The person thatcatches the ball isn’t neccesarilythe one that returns the ball. Eachteam member becomes the bowler,who rolls the ball towards the trapand tries to hit it. If he hits the trap,the front part of the trap (a 5 inchsquare) falls down so everyone cansee the out is registered.

The term bowler is used differentlyfrom cricket. In cricket the bowler isthe one who delivers the ball to thebatsman, the equivalent of thebaseball pitcher. But in bat and

trap, the bowler is the one who rollsthe ball towards the batsman, andtries to get an out by hitting a tinytarget.

Kevin explained the format of thematch. Each team was on offenceand defence 3 times each. I ex-pected them to be called “innings”(like in cricket and stoolball), butinstead they were called “legs”. Infact, they were different games. Theteam that won 2 out of 3 legs wasthe winner, independent of thescores of the individual legs. If legone was 32-0, and leg two is 4-5,the overall score is still 1-1. “A bitlike the 1960 World Series” I said,but no-one paid attention.

We mused over theimplications of thegame. The key skill ofthe game seemed tobe rolling the ballalong a long pitch,trying to hit a thetrap, a very smalltarget. A bit like lawnbowling. Except thatthe pitch was not asfinely groomed,meaning that thebowler should knowthe hills and dales aswell as a PGA golfer.Mike deduced thathome field advantagewould be very great,because the local

team would know their own pitchmuch more than the visitors.

The game was played by both menand women, but never women-only,unlike stoolball. It was organisedinto leagues within districts, anduniquely in the county of Kent.

We asked Peter if there was anyconnections with teams in othercountries, and he said they some-time played international matches.We started to get interested, andthen he explained it was betweenEnglish vs. the Welsh or the Scotsliving in the Whitstable area. Inother words, in the opening ceremo-nies of the international matches,there was no dispute on whichanthem to play.

The game was played by a widerange of people, from their 20’s totheir 70’s, sharing only two things –love of bat and trap and love ofbeer. This being a pub sport,

Trapball Found Alive!

8

everyone had a pint in their hand,including the players. But it wasn’tdrunk too much to excess, becausethe players still had to roll a ball tohit a tiny target 21 yards away.

Peter joined us after batting, andexplaine that a batsman can onlylose, and a bowler can only gain.We understood. The chore of thebatsman (i.e. to hit a ball straightahead without too much deviation,without defensive intervention) wasso easy that it was taken as a given;whereas the chore of the bowler (i.e.to roll a ball to hit a tiny target 12leagues away) was so unlikely it wasconsidered a fluke when it hap-pened. An interesting split ofresponsibilites. But because theyrotated, each player would get hishand at both roles.

I supposed we could add to that therole of the fielder,which is nothing. Allthe person that re-trieves the ball does ispass it to the bowlerwhose turn it is.Whether he catches itin an Ozzie Smith-stylecatch, or dropped it sixtimes before shovellingit up, it really doesn’tmatter. It doesn’t affectthe scoring.

A lot of the playersactually fielded the ballwith their feet. Theywould kick it to a stopbefore picking it up.Mike theorised that itwas because they were used tofootball as the dominant sport, andI suggested it was because theydidn’t want to spill their beer. Bothvalid viewpoints.

Of course, this mirrors the longassociation between baseball andbeer. A new league was formed in1882 when the National Leaguebanned beer in ballparks. Brewerieshave a long history of owningballclubs, and a hot dog and beer iswhat really tops off the baseballexperience. In fact, when SanFrancisco starting serving wine, itjust didn’t seem right. What year isthe best vintage? 1985? No, theylost 100 games that year.

Being a pub game, it was amicablylow-key, with no high-fives and no-

one doing the Dirty Bird in the endzone. Comraderie was more impor-tant than victory. But Peter assuredme that in the first division, gamesget very serious and very competi-tive.

It got late and we had a long drivehome, so after the first leg Mike andI politely excused ourselves. Webounced ideas back and forth as Idrove.

For instance, which was older,stoolball or bat and trap? Stoolballgoes farther back in the historicalrecord, but it would be difficult topinpoint which features of whichgame were derived from whichfeatures of the other game. Aninteresting point, though, is thatbat and trap has the concept of foulterritory and foul lines, which isonly shared with baseball.

We discussed the skill level neededto play the game. Being a pubgame, comeraderie is obviouslymore important than winning(except in the higher echelons asPeter explained). Or to paraphrasehim, batting is easy and bowling ishard. I suspect bowling is veryhard. It combines a steady handand an eagle eye with the ability toread the hills and dales of a hun-dred or so yards of possibly unfa-miliar turf.

We talked about comparisons withstoolball. Stoolball recruits children,is taught in schools in Sussex andmaybe surrounding areas. Bat andtrap is a pub game, and thus has acompletely different player base.Yet, as we observed the age range,

there is little danger of the gamedying out because of lack of inter-est.

Maybe the most important point wediscussed was the possibilities thatcould have sprung from such asgame as bat and trap. Admittedly itis a very simple game.

We especially found more room forthe development in the role of thefielder. Balls were hardly ever hit onthe fly, and besides that, it is therole of the fielder only to retrieve theball and give it to the bowler. Maybethey could make scoring dependenton whether he fields the ballcleanly, or something like that. Wedidn’t like the fact that the positionhad become totally relegated. Also,there was no running element. Noone ever had to move faster than aslow saunter. The batsman stood

his ground until putout, and that was it.

We wondered why thegame didn’t evolve. Butthen again, maybe it didevolve. Maybe it becamecricket.

But then what struckus was the fact that asimple game made usponder who to make thegame more interesting.This is the same proc-ess used by childrenthroughout the ages tomake things moreinteresting as they grewolder. Not just withtheir games, but with

their lives. Children would get boredand start changing the game. Whywouldn’t adults? I guess it’s be-cause children are moved keyed togrowth and having a constantly-changing world. Bat and trap hasbeen played for so long, the rulesseem to be set in stone. The fact is,the minute you codify a game, youstart to stifle it.

It may sound corny, but the growthin bat and ball games from informaland/or amateur games to finelycodified professional sports mirrorsthe human growth from childhoodto adulthood.

Perhaps we were over-analysing.Besides, the night air was clear andthe night blossoms were fragrant.

The Dinosaur hunters II (con’t)

9

by Mike RossCUBA MISSION

In case there is some doubt,baseball and antique Americanautos are doing just fine inCuba. The Cubans generallyappear to love Americans and itis quite certain that baseballhas been our charm, despite thefact that Cuban politics hasbeen prickly toward us, and viceversa.

My first adventure was in the mainsquare situated between the old cityand central Havana, within view ofthe National Capitol. There I cameacross a heated baseball discussionby a large ruckus of Cuban men, amajority of whom acted as LouPiniella takingup a rulescomplaint withan umpire. To astranger, withthe apparentrage and gesticu-lations, therewas cause foralarm – but notreally. I learnedthat this wastalking baseballCuban Style andan alarming styleof debate for amost simpaticoof people. A fewbaseball cardsdid not go amisswith these goodfolk either.

Going to Cuba as a baseball envoyand handing out baseball cards asseeds of friendship helped make thetrip purposeful and honourable; thekids were overjoyed with theirPalmeiro’s and Canseco’s. AlthoughI went to the island blind, notknowing what and where to find thebaseball genie, four events tied upmy short visit nicely: 1. Walking thecity and seeing the kids invent waysof playing baseball was a treat.Action on every block. 2. Got to abig league ballgame at the Havanaballpark. 3. Discovered the exactroom in Havana which housed BabeRuth on his 1921 tour of the island,and later, in an antiquarian book-shop, found an English/Spanishbooklet commemorating the tour. 4.Lastly, visiting the main cemetery Ifound a pantheon for baseball

players, dated 1942. Whether thiscounts as serious conclusive SABRresearch I wonder; however myhope is that the findings open upother avenues and assist anotherresearcher in perhaps turning adouble play.

STREET BALL

Ill equipped with sticks and papercups, the children somehow man-aged, reinventing foul and fairterritory depending on the lay of theland, just like it was in Americawith stick ball when few inner cityplaying fields were available. Walk-ing through the main parts ofHavana, you will come across allsizes of children playing with sticksand a paper cup ball, and in somelocales one or two will have a glove

and a real wooden bat or a rubberbaseball. Each had his particularstance, that of Julio Franco beingmost obvious but clearly those kidsknew what they were doing and whothey wanted to be. It was interestingto observe that nowhere in HavanaCentral did they play lengthwise inthe street, rather across ways. Or inalley spaces between streets, mostlywith scrub rules with a first baseonly; make it to first and back andyou stay at bat. Countless timespassers-by will be obliged to retrievethe ball and toss it back. Of coursetrying to look cool. My wearing aWhite Sox cap for protection fromthe sun was a sure-fire way ofwinning friends and unsolicitedexchanges of conversation, the firstquestion always being “Are youAmerican?” The Cuban people loveAmericans.

On the ride back to the airport Iasked my driver to go via the BuenaVista district. With its newly ac-quired fame it was worth a look,maybe to find The Buena VistaSocial Club, though it turned out tobe terribly poor and run down. Agame was going on, softball, flatpitch, tricky pitching, played long-ways because the streets were widerand there was less street activity inthis suburb. Four kids, all withgloves, were at it; the batter lookedgood choking up on a big woodenbat. He had his glove down forhome plate. A vital detail was thatthere was an adult man umpiringand calling pitches. The driverstopped to let me take a quicksnapshot. I was unable to commu-nicate my desire to find out how thegame worked with the added com-

plexity of balls andstrikes… And soanother researchchore lingers.

BALLPARK

Politicos and propa-ganda go hand inglove with sportingevents in Cuba: “Our

freedom is non

negotiable” is themotto boldly writtenon the front ofHavana’s modernstadium, built for themost recent Pan-American Games.

Unfortunately, the big league gamesare staged in a ballpark of a muchmore modest calibre. I had wantedto witness Cuban baseball sincereading a Roger Angell article manyyears earlier; he reported hispleasure when the baseball stadiumwas shipshape. On this occasionthings were not as good: and thestate of the structure was dilapi-dated, peeling paint, poor lighting,and the facilities were rough anddirty. There were no programs. Asfor the ballpark food: if Cubans canafford it, you do not want it. Theyare on an average wage of about$20 a month, and for them ticketsare virtually free. For us $3.

I was partly distracted but amusedas my newly acquired companion, aCanadian who made arrangements,spent the middle innings of a

Buena Vista Baseball Club

10

thrilling contest negotiating with anusher for a signed jersey by thehome team, as well as a ball andwhatever else 20 dollars could buy,which was a great deal for him andfor the players who would havejoyfully received probably a buckand a half each. The game was themost exciting one could devise ifinclined to invent it. Angell hadmentioned the fervour of the fans.So, it was bad luck when thevisiting team scored four runs inthe first and took the fans out of thegame, aided by the Havana firstbaseman dropping a routinepop-up. The fielding lookedsloppy until suddenly thequality transformed and Ha-vana started playing big leagueball. The crowd came alive asgradually the home teamclawed back to tie in theseventh, take a one run lead inthe eighth, and win in the topof the ninth on a play fromdeep left for the final out on aclose call at the plate. You rootfor the home team and whenthey win you share in the joy ofthe crowd.

THE RITZ

I was in the market for a roomchange in case my currentreservation could not beextended. I walked across thesquare to the Ritz, now indecay since its days of glory.The one available room wasenormous. I saw there were twofoldout cot beds which nixedthe place for me. I turned toleave and found the reason thebaseball gods had placed me in thatparticular room; upon examination Iwas faced with what I would de-scribe as a shrine to Babe Ruth. Itwas set up on one wall just insidethe main entrance, explaining why Idid not see it on entering. Fourlarge framed photos of the Babe inaction hung on the wall in front of araised glassed enclosed display caseholding a bat, various articles and aball with indications that Babe Ruthhad indeed slept there. I was not atonce aware of the significance untila few days later. I have reason tobelieve that Cuban baseball fansare not aware of this shrine to theBabe. In fact my first reaction was“These Cubans really are baseballcrazy”. I did not realize the signifi-

cance until a few days later. Whilepreparing to leave for the airport Istrolled into Chinatown for lunch(where else?). Afterwards just downthe street I spied a street stallselling antiquarian books. This iswhere research does the work foryou: As I was searching through apile of old baseball cards (hoping tofind the Honus Wagner big ticket),the vendor handed me a yellowbooklet which was of course wasnothing less than English/Spanishaccount of Babe Ruth’s 1921 tour ofthe Island conducted and promotedby none other than John McGraw.

Muggsy’s picture along with a shotof the Ritz Hotel was a main spread.

The text was confusing and shab-bily edited. Nonetheless I tel-ephoned the author Yuyo Ruiz inPuerto Rico when I got back toLondon. I told him about the Ritzshrine. He said, surprised if notshocked, “I didn’t know aboutthat”. He had credited Cubanbaseball sources in his book andthey too were obviously unaware ofthe shrine. Yuyo was not forthcom-ing or of a generous nature, and Isuppose the shrine is still oursecret.

NECROPOLIS CRISTOBAL COLON

Again by chance, on the outskirts ofHavana, I found yet another base-ball shrine described in Spanish asa “pantheon” situated outside theup-market central placements ofthis grandest of graveyards. It islaid out as a little ‘city of the dead’with a grid of streets. In fact to getto the placement indicated in theguide map, which I spotted simplyby the word baseball, I was obligedto take a taxi from the entrance. Itwas an astonishing edifice, perhaps

14 feet at its highest point, withan effigy of a ballplayer in uni-form towering over. The bigger-than-life figure is truncated afoot below the crotch, with hisleft hand resting on the knob of abat. Before him, just where thethree-quarter length statue ends,is a ball in a catcher’s glovelaying flat, above eye level. It isfronted on its pedestal by anunidentifiable round moustachedhead carved as part of the overallpiece. Below on a granite sup-porting pedestal, about 8 feethigh, are two bronze crossed batswith a catcher’s mitt and ball inthe middle, surrounded by alaurel with a large round bronzeportrait beneath, engraved“Emilio Sabourin – annos 1878-

1895”. It is not clear as towhether this inscription relatesto the main figure, however it isclear that a representation of acatcher is intended as a featureddetail.

On the main supporting base ofthe edifice, probably 200 squarefeet, upon which all the sectionsstand, are several raised stone

graves, and beneath centred at thebottom is the main inscription:“ASSOCIATION CRISTIANA DE

PLAYERS UMPIRES y MANAGERS

DE BASE-BALL PROFESSIONAL,

1942” Without an acute grasp ofSpanish it is still clear the gravehonours an Association of Chris-tians, and the various names listedare of those who sponsored andfinanced the site. Above, on thefront of one of the raised stonegraves off to one side is a promi-nently displayed white stone plaquecarved in black letters the heading:“SECUNDARON EFICAZMENTE LA

CONSTRUCCION DE ESTE

PANTEON”, followed by 14 names.Loose translation: Pantheon built by

for these gentlemen: “Los Senores:

Buena Vista Baseball Club, con’t

11

Horacio Alonso, Jose Sosa, Antonio

Mosa, Antonio Ma de Cardenas,

Alfredo Suarez, Paul J. Miller, Pedro

M. Bauza, Rafael Inclan, Miguel

Angel Gonzalez, Euslaquio Gutierrez,

Alfredo Menendoz, Manuel Alonso,

Tomas Miguillon, Jose Ma

Fernandez.” On the end of the mainplatform is another white and blackplaque with a list of men inscribed:“ESTE PANTEON SE CONSTRUYO

POR INICIATIVA DE” (and below insmaller letters): Los senores: Alberto

Azoy, Manuel Alonso, Gonzalo

Sanchez, Antonio Chavez, Emilio

Hernandez, Jose Castener, Manuel

Padron. This would represent andearlier sponsorship. What is obvi-ously a much later addition is aplaque with a bust carved in relief,beneath which is the name “Dr.

Antonio Mesa, 1959”. This plaque ispositioned on a raised pedestalportion of the grave, level with thecrossed bats of the centrepiece. Onthe plaque itself inscribed besidethe bust is the inscription: “Dr.

Antonio Mesa Valdes”. With theinscription: “FUE GRAN

CUIDADANO Y DE BUEN DE

DEPORTISTA. GRAN ABOGADO Y

HONORABLE PRESIDENTE DE LA

ASS. C. DE U. Y M. DEL BASE BALL

PROFESSIONAL” translates as: “Agood citizen and sportsman... a

lawyer and honorable president of

the Association [C.de U. y M ] of

professional baseball.” On the raisedportion on the other side of thecrossed bat centrepiece is a roundbronze plaque with a portraitinscribed “ANTONIO MARIA DE

CARDENAS”.

This amazing site sadly has beenvandalized and it appears that atleast two plaques have been re-moved. Various pieces of salvagedstone have been assembled infor-mally on or beside the graves. Withonly token searching, I have indica-tion that many of these names aretypical of northern Spain, wheremany emigrated to Cuba in the 19th

century. The name of Rafael Inclan,perhaps by coincidence perhapsrelates to a well known Spanishwriter, Suarez Inclan (could he be aCuban Roger Angell?). The conclu-sion is: There is much to be discov-ered with to baseball in Cuba.

View from the Chair by Mike Ross

I shall ramble and get a fewisolated Hail Mary observationsready for the brutal Hoerchnerdeadline:

Regarding the UK Europe com-mittee and its chores, I feel wehere differ from other commit-tees inasmuch as we haveliterary and intellectual in-trigues surrounding the game,which would make for a goodstory if anyone here cared aboutit. Unlike the other SABR com-mittees, the sources for makingtheir discoveries, while oftendeeply buried, are seeminglyendless; with us the sources areendless and buried so endlesslydeep, with hardly a clue to setus out with pick and shovel.Little has happened here in thepast century that does not leadto endless dead ends; hence wehave little opportunity to cel-ebrate any meaningful discover-ies.

However, in this issue, we feast onJim Comb’s astute assessment ofHenderson’s book Ball, Bat and

Bishop to a point where in a trulycooperative - yet separate effort -Martin Hoerchner raises the bareven further to open up theHenderson story to new heights,albeit with a different result. I feelwe have achieved a step in a for-ward direction that suggests ourwork is not all in vain here. Thereare so few places to dig, we areoften found to be digging in similarground.

At the very centre of all our fun andgames, we are always obliged toplay the cricket card if we are to getanywhere with an understanding ofbaseball, its origins and the Eng-lish. Cricket is a English upperclass game and that is that, andthat is where baseball stops. It isthe preserve of the landed gentry,not one of whom have I ever knownto speak a complimentary word onbaseball. Baseball is a biter enemy,a taboo word that can clear a roomin minutes. So on we search tofigure it out and wonder if theAmerican Revolution had anythingto do with the right to play baseball.Baseball is a symbol of freedom,

and let’s leave it at that.

Softball has succeed for the samereasons that all bat and ball gamesthroughout history grew up, thatbeing the mating game so muchencouraged by the church here.Hardly surprising that OliverCromwell’s Roundheads took aimand smashed a stained glasswindow at Gloucester cathedraldepicting a man with bat and ball.Of course those Puritan rowdiesand their inspired ethos wereadverse to all fun and games,especially on Sundays. That batand ball made it to the stained-glass window indicates a compari-son today with the cover of Voguemagazine. That was real publicityfor bat and ball.

I will leave you with one poignanttale which recently sent my headreeling. Having a few short yearsago entered the stately home ofcricket under the auspices of itslibrarian curator, the learnedStephen Green, with privileges farbeyond my station to take a place inthe sacred Long Room at LordsCricket Ground. You have to be amember to sit there and becoming amember has much to do with whoyour great-grandparents were. Allmembers have one thing in com-mon, land wealth and influentialforebears. When a player comes tobat, a turn that can last for threedays or three seconds, he mustpass through the long room and thisplayer, after having struck out for aduck (out on the first ball), he israther hangdog coming backthrough the long room to the chang-ing rooms to an awful silence. So inmy wandering around the LordsPavilion, bars, eateries, lounges,terraces and picnic areas, I chancedto spot a large painting in one of themember’s rooms which I pointedout to Allen Synge, our BobbyThomson cricket attaché, that thispainting was, on careful investiga-tion, not of a cricket player but of aboy with a trap and ball and bat.When same was pointed out toGreen, the painting was suddenlyremoved for cleaning. However Iwas subsequently informed that thesame painting was ‘in storage south

of the river’. I doubt if this revision-ist notion on canvas will ever againgrace the glorious light of Lordscricket ground. That painting wasindeed not cricket; it was signifyingthe start of hardball…

12

THIS SABR’D ISLE by Martin Hoerchner

A while back I saw something on TVthat made my mouth drop down indisbelief and my blood pressure risein horror. No, it wasn’t the sixthgame of the World Series. Moreabout that later. It was an episodeof the Steven Spielberg mini-series“Taken”, which is about alienabduction.

This episode took place in 1962,and in the background of a verydramatic scene, was a radio playingGame 7 of the World Series. It wasthe bottom of the ninth, two out,the Giants were trailing by a run,Willie Mays was on second, MattyAlou was on third, and WillieMcCovey was at bat. Ralph Terrywas pitching for the Yankees – thesame pitcher that had given up theseries-ending home run by BillMazeroski two years earlier. 1962was a year that the Giants had todefeat the Dodgers in a three-gamepost-season series, just like 1951,except they were both on the westcoast now.

The Spielberg series on TV was inthe middle of a very dramatic scene,life and death type of thing, but Ididn’t hear a word they were saying.My ears were glued on the radiocommentary. This was maybe theclosest World Series ever, and itwould end in Yankee victory andGiants defeat. If McCovey had hit asingle he would have won the game.But he lined out to shortstop BobbyRichardson. If the ball had been hita few feet to one side, the Giantswin. But it was not to be. Thatsmall radio clip brought a wholewave of sad memories and disap-pointment back to me – thanks alot, Steve!

However, that was not the heart-stopper. What really shocked mewas the attribution in the endcredits, stating something like“World Series radio compliments ofMajor League Baseball, New York

Yankees vs. New York Giants 1962”.I couldn’t believe what I was seeing!Especially in a production associ-ated with Mr. Spielberg, who issynonymous with quality in film. Sodidn’t he know that in 1962 theGiants were spending their fifthyear in San Francisco?

So I got this idea that I should writemy Senator and propose a new law,that any copyrightable work (book,radio program, TV show, film, etc.) –if they have a reference to baseballmore than 40 years in the past –should have a SABR member onstaff as technical advisor. I think wecan get this law passed and it mightmean work for some of us!

When I talked about the bad memo-ries that came flooding back, ofcourse I was talking about the1912, 1917, and 1924 World Series,which share with 1962 as being theclosest MLB championships ever.All were lost by the Giants insudden death in the seventh gamedue to incredibly fluky circum-stances.

Game 7 (actually 8, because of anearlier tie) of the 1912 World Seriestook place in Fenway Park, in itsfirst year, with Giants legendChristy Matthewson pitching inrelief in the bottom of the tenthinning. A series of really strangehappenings, including Snodgrass’muff and an easy popup that wentunfielded, gave the Red Sox finalvictory in the bottom of the 10thinning.

Game 7 of the 1917 World Series isknown for “Heinie’s dash”. TheWhite Sox won their last Series in afluky play in Game 7 in which theyhad a runner at third and thecatcher had gone off to coveranother play. With the plate un-guarded, the runner bolted forhome, with Heinie Zimmerman, theGiants third baseman, running

after him with the ball comicallyextended in his outstretched fin-gers.

Game 7 of the 1924 World Serieswas won by the Washington Sena-tors (their first and only), after aneasy ground out hit a pebble andbounced over the head of theGiants shortstop (future Hall ofFamer), not once but twice, and theGiants catcher, fielding an easypopup, tripped over his mask thathe had thrown down earlier and letthe ball roll away harmlessly. Oneof the Senators later suggested thatGod had played a hand, to let a finefellow like Walter Johnson finallywin a World Series ring.

Those of you who know me, knowthat everything I’ve written so far isabout the 2002 World Series. Afterthe eighth inning of Game 6, I knewthe Giants would fulfil their destinyand lose another World Series. TheGiants have won a few – five intotal, not counting 1888 and 1889 –but have lost 12, which ties theYankees and Dodgers as being themost of any franchise, but withfewer wins. It was an exciting WorldSeries, with the momentum shiftingthree times. After Game 5, thegreatest single game World Seriesvictory, I was on such a high, upuntil the eighth inning of Game 6.Then when things started unravel-ling, it all came into focus. I washorribly disappointed, but nothorribly surprised. I knew theGiants were merely fulfilling theirdestiny.

Someday the hurt will ease, and I’llbe able to watch the videos. It was agreat Series, with lots of greatmoments. I have to be proud thatthe Giants did as well as they did.

Still, you have to ask yourself whothey traded in 1920 that cursedthem so much.

Chairman of SABR UK and co-chairman of Baseball in UK/Europe Committee: Mike Ross, 2B Maida Avenue, London W2 1TF

(Tel: 020 7723 9848, Fax: 020 7724 0929, E-mail: michael.ross33@ntl.com); Secretary: Michael Olenick, 21 Silvercliffe

Gardens, New Barnet, Herts EN4 9QT (Tel: 020 8449 1806, E-mail: michael.olenick@tesco.net); Treasurer: Andy Parkes,

29 The Hawthorns, 114 Edge Lane, Manchester M32 8QA (Tel and Fax: 0161 865 5859); Co-chair of Baseball in UK/Europe

Committee: Jim Combs, The Old Bakehouse, High Street, Seend, Melksham, Wilts SN12 6NU (E-mail: jsbmoc@aol.com);

British Baseball History: Patrick Carroll, 53 Wendron Street, Helston, Cornwall, TR13 8PT (Tel: 01326 573 781, E-mail:

pljcarroll@madasafish.com); Publications Editor: Martin Hoerchner, Madalla, Chelsfield Lane, Orpington, Kent BR6 7RS

(Tel: 01689 815 595, E-mail: martin@hoerchner.com); Webmaster: Will Fulford-Jones, 8 Gateway Mews, Shacklewell

Lane, London E8 2DF (Tel: 020 7275 0058, E-mail: wiseacre@clara.net); Procedural Advisor: Hugh Robinson, 567 Kings

Road, Stretford, Manchester M32 8JQ (Tel: 0161 286 7012); Honourary President: Norman Macht; Honourary Vice-Presi-

dent: Monte Irvin

OFFICERS