How Baseball Happened - Outrageous Lies Exposed! the True Story Revealed

How baseball evolved with shocking speed from a casual folk game into a serious adult activity, an instrument of national unification and then a national entertainment industry.

List of contents

Introduction by John Thorn

Amateur Era Timeline

Chapter One: The Wrongness of Baseball History

Chapter Two: Wasps in the Attic

Chapter Three: Escape from the City

Chapter Four: What Makes a River

Chapter Five: It Happened in Brooklyn

Chapter Six: A Ballplayer's Tale

Chapter Seven: Philadelphia Stories

Chapter Eight: Amateur Hour

Chapter Nine: Traveling Team

Afterword

Appendix 1: Game Versus Sport

Appendix 2: What happened to . . .

Bibliography

Photo Credits, Notes

Index

About the author

Thomas W. Gilbert is the author of many baseball books, including Baseball and the Color Line, Roberto Clemente and Playing First. From his Greenpoint, Brooklyn stoop he can throw a baseball to the former site of the Manor House tavern, where members of the Eckford Baseball Club enjoyed a post-game drink or two in the 1850s.

Summary

How baseball evolved with shocking speed from a casual folk game into a serious adult activity, an instrument of national unification and then a national entertainment industry.

Foreword

HOW BASEBALL HAPPENED (paperback)

• Author radio tour (focus on sports radio)



• PR push with baseball bloggers



• Author events at Cooperstown and elsewhere



• Featured in Godine newsletter



• Author take-over on social media



• Paperback publication timed for Spring Training, and start of the new season, 2022



• Retaining cover art, new review quotes and blurbs front and back cover (including a Wall Street Journal rave on the front cover and “Winner of the Casey Award: Best Baseball Book of the Year” on the back)

Additional text

WINNER OF THE CASEY AWARD: BEST BASEBALL BOOK OF THE YEAR

“Explores the conditions and factors that begat the game in the 19th century and turned it into the national pastime. The book explains how almost all conventional wisdom about baseball’s origins and formative years is wrong. A delightful look at a young nation creating a pastime that was love from the first crack of the bat.”
—Wall Street Journal

“Best gift book of the year! Gilbert digs deep into baseball history to separate fact from fiction when it comes to the origins of the American pastime. He contends that neither Abner Doubleday, Alexander Cartwright nor Henry Chadwick fathered the game but rather it was originated by a group of amateurs in New York City.”
—New York Post

“Baseball has fabricated its own history several times over, but its origin story matters. In this entertaining narrative, Gilbert shows how the game was developed by amateurs, in part to introduce healthier habits and the sporting life in a country that didn't really have either.”
—Milwaukee Journal Sentinel

“Brilliantly gathers hidden treasure long buried in newspaper accounts and diaries to present a rich and nuanced picture of American baseball as it grew and blossomed. Along the way, he explodes myths that have long shaped our understanding of this great game. This is a tart and funny trip through the raucous and aspiring culture that shaped baseball, with its volunteer firefighters, urban professionals, bloodstained butchers, and brawling gamblers.”
—Edward Achorn, author of Every Drop of Blood: The Summer of Beer and Whiskey and Fifty-nine in ’84

“A lively and often funny account of how baseball became THE national sport. At once irreverent and loving, Gilbert explodes baseball's founding myths while painting a rich portrait of a forgotten America. For baseball lovers and history buffs alike.”
—Robert Kagan, author of The Jungle Grows Back: America and Our Imperiled World

“A brilliant new approach to our game and its author tells a hundred stories you haven’t heard before.”
—John Thorn, Official Historian, Major League Baseball

Product details

• Authors: Thomas W. Gilbert, Thomas W./ Thorn Gilbert
• Assisted by: John Thorn (Introduction)
• Publisher: GODIN
• Languages: English
• Product format: Paperback / Softback
• Release: 01.03.2022, delayed
• EAN: 9781567927238
• ISBN: 978-1-56792-723-8
• No. of pages: 384
• Subjects: Guides > Sport > Ball sport; Non-fiction book > History > Miscellaneous; New York City, Brooklyn, SPORTS & RECREATION / Business Aspects, SPORTS & RECREATION / History, HISTORY / United States / Civil War Period (1850-1877), HOLIDAY / Father's Day, SPORTS & RECREATION / Cultural & Social Aspects, US Northeast: Mid-Atlantic States