Retrosheet announces Summer 2018 updates
By David W. Smith
I am very happy to announce the semiannual update to the Retrosheet.org website. We have many additions to our site and I am proud of out accomplishments since last November.
1. Box scores for the 1907 season have been completed and proofed. Tom Ruane led this effort as usual along with help from Jonathan Frankel and Dave Lamoureaux. Thanks to the efforts of this crew, we now have full box scores for the last 111 seasons.
2. The “deduction project” in which we construct play-by-play accounts of missing games by careful use of newspapers, especially the detailed games stories that were once so common. This time we release 1939 and 1940, adding to the front of our contiguous block of play by play as usual so that we now have full play by play of every game for the last 79 seasons. Many people have contributed to this work with Tom Thress, Dick Cramer and new volunteer Rob Wood completing the most games although we also have major contributions from Jim Herdman, Mark Pankin, Jim Wohlenhaus, and John Gabcik. Of course, this work depends entirely on having the newspaper accounts in hand in a usable, digital format. Tom Thress, Rob Wood, Cliff Blau, Jim Herdman and Wayne Townsend have donated a lot of time and downloaded game stories from newspapers.com. In addition, Chuck Wessell has spent hours in the library scanning images from microfilm. All of this work is greatly appreciated as we proceed with this effort.
3. We have also completed the proofing of play-by-play files from 1923, 1924, and the 1921 AL (the NL was done previously). Although these seasons are still missing some games which will eventually be deduced, I think it is valuable to get the information we have available as soon as possible. These new releases cover over 80% of the games back through 1921. We now provide play-by-play data for the last 97 seasons.
Thanks to the many visitors to our site who have submitted suggestions for changes and corrections. The Retrocommunity is a dedicated group which makes all of our work possible.
DAVID W. SMITH is the founder and president of Retrosheet. He can be reached at dwsmith@retrosheet.org.
Originally published: June 19, 2018. Last Updated: June 19, 2018.