Glory Fades Away: The Nineteenth-Century World Series Rediscovered

by Jerry Lansche

Book Overview

No Synopsis Available.

• Format: Hardcover
• Language: English
• ISBN: 0878337261
• ISBN13: 9780878337262
• Release Date: January 1991
• Publisher: Taylor Publishing Company (TX)
• Length: 24 Pages
• Weight: 1.70 lbs.

Customer Reviews

If you're a true baseball fan, you'll love this!

Most baseball fans think the World Series started in 1903 but the National League and the American Association, considered a major league at the time, played for bragging rights in 1882. Twelve other championship series followed prior to the turn of the century. In GLORY FADES AWAY, Jerry Lansche recounts these series. But he does much more than that. He starts with a history of baseball, taking us back to Alexander Cartwright who formed the New York Knickerbockers; he also changed the shape of the field from a square to a diamond, reduced the lineup to nine, and placed the bases ninety feet apart and codified the rules for the game. Lansche then takes us through the Civil War all the way up to 1869 when the Cincinnati Red Stockings became the first professional team and 1876 when the National League was formed. Lansche also places baseball in a wider social setting. For instance, there were over a hundred thousand saloons and three thousand distilleries spread throughout the country. Half the male population visited a saloon at least once a week. Baseball had its share of hard drinkers and baseball players in general were considered roughnecks. Gambling was also a problem. Let it suffice to say that the 1919 Black Sox series was not the first series to be fixed. Speaking of the Black Sox, I wonder how many people know that the owner Charlie Comiskey was also once a slick fielding first baseball for the St. Louis Browns, who defeated the Chicago White Stockings in seven games in 1885. Coincidentally, Cap Anson, the first man to reach 3,000 hits also played in this series on the losing side. Many other Hall of Famers played in these championship series. Hoss Radbourne, the only pitcher to win sixty games in a season, won three games for the Providence Grays in the 1884 series. Probably the most interesting group was the 1896 Baltimore Orioles who played Cy Young's Cleveland Spiders. The Orioles averaged .328 that year. Hughie Jennings hit .398 with a 112 RBIs. Wee Willie Keeler had 214 hits and scored 153 runs. Muggsy McGraw had malaria that year but he was the heart and soul of the team. But the Orioles were primarily know for their "win-at-all-costs" attitude, cutting corners on the base paths, snagging an opposing players belt loop on his way around third etc. Lansche also includes sidebars on "The Changing Game." For instance in 1882, the pitching mound was only fifty feet from home plate but the pitcher had to throw seven balls before the batter was given first. In 1887 the number of bad pitches required was reduced to five. A batter could no longer ask for a high or a low pitch. Also in 1887, Cap Anson originated spring training when he took his White Stockings to Hot Springs, Arkansas, prior to the season. Numerous pictures are included. A young, skinny John J. McGraw pictured in 1899 his hair parted in the middle; "hard-drinking, free-spending" Mike "King" Kelly leaning on a bat; an autographed picture of a young Cy Yo

GREAT BOOK

A really enjoyable history of baseball's World Series in the nineteenth century. Sorry it's out of print...