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In the 1912 season Rube Marquard, the left-handed pitcher of the National League (NL) New York Giants, won nineteen consecutive games and it was thought at the time to be one game shy of the record. The record was thought to be twenty, set by John Perkins “Pat” Luby, a right-handed pitcher for the NL […]

Upon the conclusion of the 1889 season, attention in baseball shifted to preparations for the coming war between the owners and players. The Brotherhood, its complaints heard but basically unaddressed, positioned itself for a break with the principals of the National League and the American Association. Although the Association was clearly affected by the events […]

A crowd heads toward Braves Field. The ticket and administration building (shown at left) still stands and today serves as the headquarters for the Boston University police. Note the trolley tracks in the foreground, indicating the path of transit vehicles exiting from within the ballpark itself. (National Baseball Hall of Fame Library)   The best stories […]

Who deserves to be inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame, and who does not? The Hall of Fame electors wrestle with this question every year. The selection process for players causes controversy on an annual basis, but the institution, since its inception, has also grappled with the issue of recognition for non-playing contributors. Some […]

This article was originally published in SABR’s The National Pastime, Winter 1985 (Vol. 4, No. 2).   J. Lee Richmond played four full seasons and parts of two others in baseball’s major leagues. Not a long career. Today, more than 100 years later, a check of his statistical record reveals little that would seem to […]

Across the decades, professional actors and athletes have shared a special camaraderie. Both are paid entertainers, performing for the pleasure of the masses. So not surprisingly, many thespians are vocal supporters of their favorite ball teams. Back in the day, for example, Tallulah Bankhead was a famed New York Giants fan-atic. (“There have been only […]

The turbulence in the business of baseball reached its height in 1890. The players, through their Brotherhood association and chafing under the owners’ efforts to exert more control over them, assembled the financial backing to form their own league, the aptly-named Players’ League. The magnates of the National League and the American Association — particularly […]

  Bud Fowler’s election to the National Baseball Hall of Fame in December 2021 has brought new attention to this Black baseball pioneer of the nineteenth century. Fowler was one of the first Black players to make a living in so-called “Organized Baseball,” playing for a series of otherwise all-white teams between 1878 and 1895 […]

Who invented baseball? This question has held a niche in the American consciousness since the 1880s. The most widely known answer is that Abner Doubleday invented baseball in 1839 in Cooperstown, New York. The casual observer who knows one thing about baseball’s origin knows the Doubleday story. The next answer is that Alexander Cartwright invented […]

Of the major league teams that trace their history before 1960, most started out with several short-term unofficial nicknames or even no nickname at all. Although several reputable sources provide a history of these nicknames, there are numerous contradictions between the available sources, and sometimes even when these sources agree, they conflict with the original […]