Who’s On First?

IF NINETEENTH-CENTURY America survives anywhere as something more than an artifact, ” says John Thorn, “it is in baseball, that strangely pastoral game in no matter what setting—domed stadium or Little League field. ” Thorn, who assembled the portfolio of baseball pictures in this issue, is editor of The National Pastime , a handsomely produced publication sponsored by the Society for American Baseball Research (P.O. Box 323, Cooperstown, NY 13326). And like all of SABR’s three thousand members, he is interested in exploring and preserving the legacy of the sport. To this end he has recently established a Nineteenth Century Baseball Research Committee, which is seeking photographs of players, ball parks, magnates, and paraphernalia going back to 1845. The thirty-member panel will attempt to determine the identities of old ball clubs, the names of players, locations of parks, dates of games. The goal, says Thorn, “is to establish a pictorial as well as a documentary record of baseball as it was played then. If any AMERICAN HERITAGE readers have photos of nineteenth-century baseball at whatever level, amateur or professional, they would be doing SABR—and history—a service by allowing us permission to make copies of their prints.” Inquiries and offerings should go to John Thorn, 18 Virginia Avenue, Saugerties, NY 12477. All material will be returned to the owners safely and promptly.