Library of Congress Spalding's official base ball guide, 1906 SPALDING'S OFFICIAL BASE BALL GUIDE 1906 2 2w , . q , I , A R | | -I I ' .-Yj.--l~,;;~w.~Q j~hihW~IIY~li*lO~*UIi; ; A. G. SPALDING. Spalding's Official Base Ball Guide ii ;R " :.;- - ~ HENRY CHADWICK, "The Father of Base Ball," at Eighty-two. Photograph taken January, 1906, by Frank Pearsall, Brooklyn. PREFACE sa i U1IERAVRY Qf 00NGRESS '~, -PREFACE The American Sport s Publishing Company this year present'- tional in its character; inasmuch as this 'year's issue is9. the : twenty-fifth under the editorial control of the veteran journalist, Mr. Henry Chadwick, who has been a well-know in.J, writer .on T sports and pastimes for over half a century' past, luring which , long period his specialty h as been Base Ball; hiis work, i buiid- lug up the game as our great National field sport,; .vinn,:. de- servedly earned for him his title of "The PathAero f Bai B , ;," for he began his work of evolution in the deca'de' o 'the fift'l&e? , It is worthy of note, that when the GUIDE was firs1t tpubl.diitS in 1876-thirty years ago- the book. contained bu.fotyt '.-' ' pages, thirty-five of which were devoted to the,:playing! iule's.:of the National League. In 1881, when :Mr. iChadwicfk beiiime te .. Editor of' the GUIDE, the book was increased in size to 1i300 ; and from that' year to this the GUIDE Spalding's official base ball guide, 1906 http://www.loc.gov/resource/spalding.00152 Library of Congress has been enla.rgqed,i ylar after year, until now, in 190, Iits pages' exceed- 4400, aInd ,t:he - book comprises a volume, devoted to the 'National '`Game,'Wii,' : in its statistical records, its. valuable and instructive 'chapers,' its fund of general informatin on oall points of thegam! a: ; :^.: Its special records of the championship seasons of .ai1 -.thelea" e .' known to organized Base Ball, makes the -.GUiDE of 1906 ta-h Base Ball Manual, ''par' excellence," '' f the 'perrlod "' ';: ^ ;':;: AISER~~cAN S~OETS .PULISHING~- ... , ,- . AMERICAN, SPORTs. PZULIS NeMPAXT.- * . '. '. .'- " . ** '''***^- *' '''**.'-*;* ^ * - ^ ;;"* i ;>;<*.': ^ ; j ,.^ ''^ _': INTRODUCTION I ,5 THE ORIGIN OF BASE BALL In the 1905 issue of SPALDING'S OFFICIAL BASE BALL GUIDE, a controversy arose as to the origin of the American National Game of Base Ball, between the veteran Base Ball writer, Mr. Henry Chadwick, and Mr. A G. Spalding, the latter claiming that Base Ball was distinctively of American origin, while Mr. Chadwick contends that it was of English origin. In order to settle the matter definitely--and it is to be hoped for all time- a Special Base Ball Commission was appointed, consisting of the following gentlemen, viz.: Ex- Governor Morgan G. Bulkeley, of Connecticut, now United States Senator from that State, and the first President of the National League; Hon. Arthur P. Gor- man, United States Senator from Maryland, and an old ball player and Ex-President of the famous old National Base Ball Club of Washington, D. C.; Mr. A. G. Mills, an enthusiastic ball player before and during the Civil War, and the third President of the National League; Mr. N. E. Young, of Washington, D. C., a veteran ball player, and the first Secretary and afterward President of the National League for many years; Mr. Alfred J. Reach, of Philadelphia, and Mr. George Wright, of Boston, both well known as two of the most famous players of their day. Mr. Spalding's official base ball guide, 1906 http://www.loc.gov/resource/spalding.00152 Library of Congress James E. Sullivan, of New York, the present Secretary of the Amateur Athletic Union of the United States, has acted as Secretary of the Commission, and has collected a mass of evi- dence on the subject. This evidence is now being formulated into proper shape, which, together with briefs in support of both sides of this in- teresting controversy, will soon be laid before the Commission for their consideration and decision. As the decision will not be rendered in time to be published in this year's GUIDE, it will be given in full, together with the evidence, in SPALDING'S GUIDE of 1907. The question as to the real origin of Base Ball has created widespread interest, especially from old timers, as evidenced by the mass of correspondence that has been received by Secretary Sullivan, and the verdict of the Commission is awaited with much interest by the Base Ball public. RISE AND PROGRESS OF PROFESSIONAL BASE BALL ri 11. I i i, is I's oth 8 SPALDING'S OFFICIAL BASE BALL GUIDE. The first regularly organized Base Ball team of. salaried play- ers was that of the Cincinnati club, known as the "Red Stock- ings," which team took the field in 1868, with the veteran cricketer, Harry Wright, as its manager. It was this team which, from 0ctober, 1868, to June,! 1870, played every prom- inent club in the country, North, South,. East and West, without losing a single game, a record never since equaled in the his- tory of the game. It was this remarkable achievement that gave the impetus to professional Base Ball which led to the organi- zation of the first "Professional Association", in 1871. It was, during the first five years of the existence of this latter association, that that curse of all field sports, pool gambling, got its deadly grip on professional Base Ball, and brought it almost to death's door. In 1876 the best men c6n- nected with professional Base Ball came to the rescue of the game from its worst enemies, and organizing a new association, viz., "The National League of Professional Clubs"-not of play- ers, as before, but of clubs-introduced such effective reforma- .tory measures as at once broke up the pool gambling evil and saved the life of professional'Base Ball. The great contrast presented between the government of the Spalding's official base ball guide, 1906 http://www.loc.gov/resource/spalding.00152 Library of Congress "Professional Players' Association" and that of the- National League df Clubs, was such, in the improved work the latter accomplished, as to show the utter incompetency' of the players of the period to act in any governmental capacity. In 1875 public confidence in the integrity of play at the hands of the majority of the Association teams had vanished. But the first year of the government of the National League produced offset- ting results to an extent very satisfactory to the reform element of the professional business. T'he government of the National League, for the first ten years of its existence, was such in its character as to build up the League 'to the height of a permanently established or- ganizatioii. It had not only regained the lost public confidence in the integrity of play of the professional exemplars of Base Ball, and placed the business upon a'very reputable footing, but, by the 'excellent work of its Committee of Rules, had so im- proved the play in' the game as to approach the point of a per- fected .code -of playing rules ; in -fact, the National League, during the first decade of its history, had raised Base Ball to the culminating position of fully establishing it as the National game of America, ju'st as cricket had been, for two centuries past the Nation"algame of England. It was durifig:the decade of the'eighties that a sort of rival organization to the National League sprang into existence under SPALDING'S OFFICIAL BASE BALL GUIDE. .9 the name of the "American Base Ball Association." At first It was only a branch of the business of the National League, and was secondary to the latter in every respect But later on it assumed the position of a regular rival of the parent organiza- tion, and in that character it began to bring about a condition of affairs in professional Base Ball inimical to the best interests of the business at large, and which turned out to be very costly in its pecuniary results to both the League and the Association; inasmuch as it led to a big jump in the salaries of the players of both organizations. Then came a measure of compromise in the form of the "National Agreement," which guarded both the League and the Association from the strikes for higher salaries by their play- ers. This plan worked well up to the close of 1889, when the greed of the high salaried players led to the most serious strike known to professional Spalding's official base ball guide, 1906 http://www.loc.gov/resource/spalding.00152 Library of Congress Base Ball history; in fact, it was a regu- lar revolt, one result of which was two years of the most costly demoralization ever before recorded. The experience of this "players' strike" was, in the first place, to show again the incompetency of the players for self- government, and, secondly, the folly of their course in their revolt, of their practically "killing the goose which laid the golden eggs." From the fall of 1889 to the winter of 1891 professional Base Ball was in a decidedly demoralized condition. The players' revolt, after one season of government under their own control, had miserably failed in accomplishing what it had been started for. It was followed by a revolutionary condition of affairs in the American Association, which culminated in 1891 in their breaking of the "National Agreement," an act of folly which led to the untimely demise of the Association. Following this came an unexpected result, which changed the whole nature of professional Base Ball government, viz., the reorganization of the National League, on the basis of a circuit of twelve clubs in the place of the old limit of eight clubs, and the estab- lishment of a great major league to govern the whole profes- sional Base Ball fraternity at large.