Quiz: How Many Annual Doc Adams Events Are There?
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The Father Of The National Game Still Living In New Haven
So far the earliest reference we have found referring to Dr. Daniel Lucius ‘Doc’ Adams, M.D. as a “Father of Baseball” in June 23, 1895. That was 12 years before the Mills Commission created the Doubleday myth and 43 years before Alexander Cartwright was elected into the Hall of Fame. This article predates the seminal Sporting News interview by 8 months. This article was in a column called “Side Lights On The Ball Field” in the Chicago Chronicle. The piece teases the article with “The Father of the National Game Still Living In New Haven” and starts out with “Father … Continue reading →
First Base Ball Game At Elysian Fields
What is often referred to as the first recorded game played under the Knickerbocker Rules (now believed to be yet another intrasquad game), took place on June 19, 1846. The Knickerbockers lost to the New York Baseball Club (aka “the New York Nine”) 23–1 in four innings. Elysian Fields First Game The enduring fame of this particular game and of its players is the product of circumstance and self-aware myth-making. As the official historian of Major League Baseball, John Thorn, has written: “The history of baseball is a lie from beginning to end, from its creation myth to its rosy … Continue reading →
The Knickerbocker Experience
We’d like to highlight an effort that brings Doc Adams and the Knickerbockers to life, The Knickerbocker Experience. It is the brainchild of Jeff “Pinetar” Kornhaas, The Knickerbocker Experience, offers an opportunity to play the game as historically accurate as possible. “Rules aren’t bent” or “exceptions made” to make it work. The intent is to provide an historically accurate game of base ball. That is the point of the “Knickerbocker Experience”. Play the game as it was played in 1858, 1864 or 1865. Give people that chance to try or watch it, unrestricted by “variations or customs”. Just pure base … Continue reading →
The Bat And Ball Letter
On June 15, 1832, Doc Adams received a letter from his 11-year-old sister that has become known as the “Bat and Ball letter“. In the letter his sister Nancy sent to him at school, she said, “I have not played with your bat and ball as you bid me. I forget it every morning and indeed I have not seen it since you went away”. It is the earliest known evidence of Doc’s interest in the game. Doc was at Yale when he received this letter from his father with all the usual admonitions of you’re not studying hard enough … Continue reading →
A Little Knickerbocker Base Ball Club History
On June 5, 1846, the first honorary members were elected, viz. James Lee and Abraham Tucker. At the same meeting Curry, Adams and Tucker were appointed a committee to arrange the preliminaries, and conclude a match with the New York Base Ball Club. From all the information the writer has been able to gather, it appears that this was not an organized club, but merely a party of gentlemen who played together frequently, and styled themselves the New York Club. However, the match was played at Hoboken on June 19, 1846, it being the first the Club engaged in, and … Continue reading →
The Fly Game: Knickerbockers Vs. The Excelsiors
In the May 29, 1859 issue of The Sunday Mercury, a weekly New York newspaper that extensively covered the expanding world of base ball playing, an untitled paragraph announced the possibility of a forthcoming game that would be strikingly different from all others played during the past few years: “We have heard it rumored — we do not know with what truth — that the Knickerbocker Club, of this city, will shortly play a match with the Excelsior Club, of Brooklyn, in which they will repudiate catching the ball upon the bound.” The Sunday Mercury William Cauldwell, the editor of … Continue reading →
Do You Know Doc Adams (Chapter 3: His Legacy Lives On)
#DocAdamsBaseBall Special thanks to Jake Schmidt for all his efforts on the “Doc You Know Doc Adams?” videos. The consolidated video can be found here.
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“He’s the true father of baseball and you’ve never heard of him.” John Thorn, Official Historian of MLB “Well you know Doc saved baseball.” Fred Ivor Campbell, noted baseball historian and author “Ninety feet between home plate and first base may be the closest man has ever come to perfection.” Red Smith, sportswriter “I indulge the hope that the ‘spirit’ you express of being with us always, may be accompanied by the body on the old Play Grounds. Playing commences on the 21st. James Whyte Davis, baseball pioneer, Knickerbocker Base Ball Club “Resolved, that to him as much if not … Continue reading →
Do You Know Doc Adams? (Chapter 2: The Laws of Base Ball)
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