Who thought up Baseball?

Kainantu

In the early days of the history of basball there were several variations of the game known as Rounders, but the game had no set of 'official' rules. People played the game by their own set of rules which were decided by local customs or decisions. This led to variations in the number of players on a side, how many bases were used, the formation and distance of the bases, and other rules would vary from place to place. This game eventually led to a game known as Town Ball and then to the game we know as baseball. Some American politicians in the early 20th Century wanted to make baseball history, and to attribute the game to an American. They joined forces with Albert Spalding, a sporting goods executive and former major league baseball player, to find an American inventor for the game,and to re-write the history of baseball. They attributed the game to a former Civil War general named Abner Doubleday. They used only a letter from a childhood friend of Doubleday as evidence for their claim. The friend wrote in a letter that he had seen Doubleday playing a variation of Rounders with a group of schoolchildren in 1937 in a schoolyard in Cooperstown, New York. The game was more likely invented by a man named Alexander Cartwright in 1845 http://www.all-sports-posters.com/history-of-baseball.html Oct 14 02, 1:56 PM

RickF

Its a lot older than that! 'Despite the myth that baseball sprang full-blown from the mind of Abner Doubleday in 1839, a game called baseball was around more than a hundred years earlier. It was probably just another name for rounders at first. But A Little Pretty Pocket-Book, printed in England in 1744, mentioned both baseball and rounders, suggesting that there was some distinction between the two by then. Although primarily a boys' game, it was also played by girls. In Northanger Abbey, begun in 1796, Jane Austen said of her heroine, '. . . it was not very wonderful that Catherine should prefer cricket, base-ball, riding on horseback, and running about the country, at the age of fourteen, to books.' The game of 'bat and ball' was common in America before the Revolution, according to William Winterbotham's An Historical View of the United States (1796). By the time of the Revolution, it was commonly called 'base' or 'baste.' And it wasn't necessarily a game for boys any more: American soldiers played it at Valley Forge in 1776 and the Princeton faculty banned it from the campus in 1787.' http://www.hickoksports.com/history/baseba00.shtml Oct 14 02, 2:12 PM

Wait,

Kainantu do you mean 1837? Oct 14 02, 3:20 PM

Kainantu

Abner Doubleday June 26, 1819 - January 26, 1893 This site also has a photograph of him as well as his memorial plaque http://www.arlingtoncemetery.com/doubledy.htm The previously quoted website is obviously wrong You should heed the information submitted by RickF Oct 15 02, 2:15 AM

Create a Free FunTrivia ID to add to, request more/new answers, or edit this entry

Who thought up the names of Santa's reindeer? Who made up baseball? Hint, fought in the Civil War with Ulysses S. Grant. Who invented baseball? Who thought of the names for Santa's reindeers?

1 Mixed Up Baseball All multiple choice about a mixture of Major League Baseball. I hope that you have fun! :-) MLB Tough Tough 10 Q Nightmare Sep 05 07 867 plays 2 Baseball Dummies Up! All multiple choice created especially for the novice baseball fans who appreciate the game of Major League Baseball. I hope that you enjoy it and learn something new. :-) MLB Mixture Average 10 Q Nightmare Sep 29 08 1035 plays 3 Baseball IQ Shake Up An all multiple choice brain-knocker for Major League fans. Thanks for playing. :-) MLB Tough Tough 10 Q nightmare May 09 04 1680 plays