Wisconsin Baseball History Papers

In 2004, I presented two papers at SABR conferences on aspects of Wisconsin baseball history.

The first, which I gave at the Seymour Conference, is titled, “Challenging Everyone: The Capital City Base Baseball Club of Madison, Wisconsin, 1865-1870.”  It discusses the first wave of baseball enthusiasm in Madison and its quick fade.  Click for the PDF.

The second, which I gave at the SABR National in Cincinnati, is titled, “‘But Few Can Touch Him:’ George Wilson and Integrated Wisconsin Baseball, 1905-1907.”  Wilson was a very talented African-American pitcher who once played for the Page Fence Giants.  He went on to make a career for himself in the low minors in Wisconsin and Minnesota, usually the only black player on his team, and often the star.  Sadly, some of that paper has been lost, but click for a PDF of the first several pages and the accompanying handout.

1879 Chicago White Stockings Notes, from Chicago Tribune and Times

Several years ago, I did a fair amount of research on the 1879-87 Chicago White Stockings, focusing on Cap Anson. That included a block of time I spent going through the Chicago Tribune from late 1878 and all of 1879.

After the jump, find my notes from that research.  (At the end, there are some notes from the 1879 Chicago Times, as well.  Passages are almost always verbatim; my personal commentary is indicated by square brackets.  These are exactly as I typed them, which means there are plenty of abbreviations (I hope you can make sense of them; most of them refer to names), and there are even more typos.  Sorry about that.

Since I’ve abandoned my 19th-century baseball research, I hope this can be useful to someone.  See also my file of 1879 White Stockings box scores and my 1879-87 White Stockings notes from the Hall of Fame Library.

1879-87 Chicago White Stockings: Hall of Fame Library Notes

Several years ago, I did a fair amount of research on the 1879-87 Chicago White Stockings, focusing on Cap Anson.  I lucked into a few days at the Hall of Fame Library in Cooperstown, so I dug through several player files.

After the jump, find my notes from those files.  Passages are almost always verbatim; my personal commentary is indicated by square brackets.  These are exactly as I typed them, which means there are plenty of abbreviations (I hope you can make sense of them; most of them refer to names), and there are even more typos.  Sorry about that.

Since I’ve abandoned my 19th-century baseball research, I hope this can be useful to someone.  See also my file of 1879 White Stockings box scores.

1879 Chicago White Stockings Box Scores

As part of a long-dead, unfinished project, I collected all of the box scores of the 1879 Chicago White Stockings.  (I think it’s all of them, anyway.)  I copied them from the Chicago Tribune reports of (usually) the following day.

I’ve zipped all the individual box scores, and now they are available for anyone who may want them.  (I know–it’s difficult to imagine how you lived your life all this time without them.)

Click to download.

Ted Sullivan, Humorous Stories of the Ball Field

Several years ago, I had some free time and easy access to a well-stocked library.  For some reason, I decided to spend that time transcribing the text of Ted Sullivan’s book, Humorous Stories of the Ball Field.

Sullivan is an important figure in early baseball, especially minor league baseball.  His Wikipedia page barely scratches the surface.  His books aren’t exactly groundbreaking, but as they are first-person narratives of the 19th-century game and its characters, they have some value.

In any event, I never finished the project, though I did transcribe roughly 75,000 words.  There are plenty of typos, and quite a few missing words, as the microfilm I was working from derived from a very worn copy.  This is not a project I’ll ever return to, and since Google Books doesn’t seem to have found Sullivan’s work yet, I’ve posted the full text of what I transcribed after the jump.

Sullivan’s book should now be in the public domain, and I disclaim any rights to any value I’ve added (if, indeed, there is any).  So use it however you want.