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PIONEER PROJECT “It has long frustrated me,” wrote
John Thorn when we first began discussing this project, “that there’s a
painstakingly researched entry in the encyclopedias for every man who played one
game in the major leagues after 1870 but nobody knows or cares about what
happened to the greatest players of the 1860s.” It is just as difficult to find
even the most basic information about many of the key pioneer baseball clubs.
It is to remedy those omissions that John, Richard Malatzky and I have started
what we call “The Pioneer Project.” Our goal is to create a readable reference
source that will stimulate more research on this fascinating era and that will
place names and faces on the game’s earliest players. We are now looking for
volunteers who will increase the scope of this project; if you’re interested,
please read these questions and answers to learn more and
contact me if you might be able to help.
The Pioneer Project: Base Ball’s Earliest Clubs and
Players
What is the scope? The intention is to include
entries on about one hundred clubs that were formed during the amateur era of
baseball (before 1869). About half of those are ones we’ve already selected on
the basis of their being so historically important that they have to have an
entry. A disproportionate number of these clubs are ones from big Eastern
cities such as the Knickerbockers and Mutuals of New York, Eckfords and
Excelsiors of Brooklyn, Athletics and Olympics of Philadelphia, Tri-Mountains of
Boston, Nationals of Washington, etc., but there are also a few from other parts
of the country such as St. Louis and San Francisco. The remaining clubs will be
chosen primarily on the basis of a contributor having enough knowledge and the
willingness to write an entry about them. Basically, what we are looking for is
entries that expand our understanding of such key questions as: what factors led
early ballplayers to take up the game, what things club members had in common,
how baseball spread throughout the country and to new regions, what made the
club successful (or unsuccessful), where they played, what role they played in
their communities, how amateur clubs were affected by the coming of
professionalism and competitiveness, and how long they lasted.
Here is a preliminary list of the clubs
that we are planning to include or are considering, along with the volunteers.
How will you decide whether a club is worthy of an
entry? This is a somewhat subjective decision of course, but the biggest
thing is whether enough information about the club is available to write an
entry that provides insight into that club’s history and the lives of men who
belonged to it. If, for example, you know that the first club in a particular
town was formed in 1860 and you have a box score and the surnames of the nine
players, but little else, then we would mention that club in the introduction to
that region, but it would not warrant its own entry. But if you subsequently
find a reminiscence by one of the players or a retrospective article in a local
newspaper that provides details about when and why the club formed, and that
identifies most of the players, then that club would become a good candidate for
inclusion. And we have already collected information on many clubs, which may
complement what you know and make for an excellent article. So if you have any
interest in a particular club or in the early history of baseball in a
particular town or region, please contact us and we’ll discuss it further.
Have other books covered this? No. There are a
number of overviews of early baseball, as well as histories of early baseball in
a number of regions. But the only book remotely along these lines was Charles
Peverelly’s 1866 book and there is obviously a need to update that.
What about Marshall Wright’s book “The National Association of Base Ball
Players, 1857-1870”? Wright’s book is important and well done, but it
complements our project rather than competing with it. Wright compiled the
scores of many key clubs and some statistics for them, and we will not be
duplicating that effort. But he does not do either of the key things hope to
accomplish in this project. He does not provide narrative histories of any of
the clubs. And his rosters never consist of more than a player’s name, and
often only of their surname. Our aim is to identify as many as possible of
those players.
In what format will this project appear? We intend
to publish this as a book. The publisher is still to be determined.
Will contributors be compensated? We will make sure
that all contributors receive a free copy of the book once published. Due to
the limited market, it is very unlikely that any cash compensation will be
possible.
Can I republish a submission if I decide to do one?
That is the publisher’s decision to make, so we cannot give a definitive answer
until we determine a publisher. We intend, however, to make permission to
republication one of our main conditions in searching for the right publisher,
and believe that we can reach an arrangement that will be fair and satisfactory
to everyone.
What happens if more than one person expresses interest
in the same club? We’ll start by seeing if they are interested in combining
their efforts. If we have to select, preference will be given to volunteers who
are closer to completing their research on that club and to those who have ready
access to primary source material.
What resources do I need? Availability of resources
varies so much from region to region that there’s not much value in trying to
generalize. Access to newspapers from that area is the most important thing,
but this too varies greatly as more newspapers become available on-line. It is
also a big advantage to live in the area and be able to visit the local public
library and historical society, which often have key resources. But if you’re
interested in doing an entry, let us know and we may be able to point you to
additional resources.
What will be the format of the finished work? Each
region will have its own chapter that begins with an introduction summarizing
the spread of baseball within that region and the key clubs, rivalries and
competition. Particular attention will be given in the introduction to clubs
that did not receive an individual entry. Individual entries will follow,
consisting of a narrative of the club history and the player biographies, along
with sources and footnotes.
What should appear in the narrative history? Let’s
start with what should not appear: lists of scores, lengthy game descriptions,
and statistics of players. You should also avoid explaining the basic rules and
customs of the game, unless the club you are working on provides an especially
good illustration of those rules and customs, or unless it failed to follow
them. What should appear is a concise, readable history of the club with
answers to such key questions as: When did the club start playing baseball?
Were they one of the first clubs in the region to play by the New York rules and
if so why? What made this club tick? Did it exist as a social club as well as
a baseball club? What did its members have in common and what made belonging to
it special to them? What customs and rituals did they share? Were they
successful on the diamond? Did winning or losing seem to matter to them? When
and where did they practice? Were practice times designed to allow working-men
to participate? Where were their match games played? Who attended their match
games? What role did the club play in its community? How was this club
affected by the coming of professionalism and competitiveness? After it ended,
how did members reflect back on this club?
Naturally, it won’t always be possible to find answers to
all of these questions. And of course the entries should be based upon reliable
sources only – if you don’t know the answer to a particular question, just leave
it out.
What should be the length of the narrative history?
This is going to vary greatly based on how much material is available, and we
will encourage contributors to focus primarily on including content if it gives
us a better picture of that club’s history, and omitting it if it doesn’t. As a
rule, however, entries should be a minimum of 500 words and not more than 7,500
words (except in the case of a few very important clubs).
What about footnotes and sources? All sources need
to be acknowledged in a list of sources, as do the sources of direct quotations
and specific borrowings in footnotes. But while doing research and writing
entries, we would encourage you to keep very careful track of all sources you
used but not to worry too much at this stage about exactly what statement needs
a footnote and what doesn’t.
How can I possibly identify the players? All the local
newspaper gave were their surnames. This is by far the trickiest part of
this project. Nineteenth-century newspaper accounts indeed had the maddening
habit of usually referring to players only by their surnames. The result is
that it is impossible to identify many players. And we are definitely not going
to engage in guesswork; if we are anything less than virtually certain of a
player’s identity, we will consider him unidentified. There are entire clubs
that will have to be excluded from this project because only the players’
surnames are known and, as a result, we know very little about the club and its
players. But in most cases, with enough digging, it is possible to identify
many of the players on prominent clubs. Contemporary newspapers did
occasionally mention players’ first names, and retrospective accounts were much
better about doing so. There were also little clues about players’ identities
in newspaper coverage – details about their occupation or about family members,
for example, which make it possible to identify them. We have already begun the
massive work needed to identify early players. Richard Malatzky will be in
charge of this part of the project, and he will work with the contributors of
entries to identify players and gather information for biographical sketches.
How long should the biographical sketches be and what
should they include? This again will vary greatly; William Howard Taft or
Harry Wright warrants a much longer entry than the typical player. In general,
a sketch should be brief and include only key information like birth and death
information, profession, whether they moved often or stayed in one place, when
they got married, whether they served in the Civil War. Also be on the look-out
for things that club members have in common, such as profession, social status,
living in a particular neighborhood, ethnic background, when the family
immigrated to the U.S., etc. If it is possible to obtain an obituary, key
details about their life after baseball may also warrant inclusion. We
encourage you to collect as much detail about the players’ lives as possible, as
you never know when you’ll find something interesting and relevant. But in
general, the sketches should be short summaries of their lives, not detailed
biographies.
How important is it that all the narrative histories and
player profiles be similar in length, style and structure? Not at all.
Our main goal is high-quality entries; uniformity is much less important.
What if I want to work on a club that continued after
1868? Should I include their history after that? By all means. While the
focus of the narrative histories should be on the amateur era, how the club
responded to professionalism is an important topic. Most of the biographical
sketches should be about the members who joined the club prior to 1869, but it’s
fine to include some men from the professional era.
What is the deadline for completing an entry? We
would like to have all entries by May 1, 2009. We strongly encourage
volunteers to submit a draft by October 31, 2008, which will give us the chance
to give more feedback and help move the project along to completion.
In what format should a club’s
name appear: i.e, Knickerbockers of New York or New York Knickerbockers? We’d
like to strive for consistency in this regard, using the format in use at the
time. So Knickerbocker Base Ball Club of New York is preferred, and
Knickerbocker Club of New York or just Knickerbockers of New York, but please
avoid today’s
format of New York Knickerbockers.
I have collected
some information on a club, but don’t think it would be enough for an entry. Do
you still want to hear from me?
Yes! Your material may well be something that we can use in the introduction to
the entry for that region, and it’s even possible that someone else has
collected enough material on that club to warrant an entry.
Can you give an example of what an entry might look like? Click
on these links for entries on the Chemung club
of Stoughton, Massachusetts,
Independent Club of Mansfield, Ohio,
Clifton of Buffalo, the Excelsiors of Chicago (pre-war)
and post-war), the Niagaras of
Buffalo (pre-war) and (post-war), the
Excelsiors of Albany (NY), the
Mutuals of Janesville, the
Early Risers of Detroit, the
Daybreaks of Jackson, the
Lightfoot Club of North Brookfield,
the Forest Citys of Rockford, the
Pastime of Brooklyn, the
Ontarios of Oswego, the
Syracuse Base Ball Club, the
Central Citys of Syracuse, the
Allegheny
Base Ball Club, the
Mountains of Altoona, the
Gate City Club of Atlanta, and the
Pecatonicas of Pecatonica. These are
still works-in-progress (and suggestions for improvement are welcome), but they are in the general format we’re
looking for in finished pieces.
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