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

The untold story of baseball's nineteenth-century origins: "a delightful look at a young nation creating a pastime that was love from the first crack of the bat" (Paul Dickson, The Wall Street Journal). You may have heard that Abner Doubleday or Alexander Cartwright invented baseball. Neither did. You may have been told that a club called the Knickerbockers played the first baseball game in 1846. They didn't. Perhaps you've read that baseball's color line was first crossed by Jackie Robinson in 1947. Nope. Baseball's true founders don't have plaques in Cooperstown. They were hundreds of uncredited, ordinary people who played without gloves, facemasks, or performance incentives. Unlike today's pro athletes, they lived full lives outside of sports. They worked, built businesses, and fought against the South in the Civil War. In this myth-busting history, Thomas W. Gilbert reveals the true beginnings of baseball. Through newspaper accounts, diaries, and other accounts, he explains how it evolved through the mid-nineteenth century into a modern sport of championships, media coverage, and famous stars--all before the first professional league was formed in 1871. Winner of the Casey Award: Best Baseball Book of the Year

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. John Thorn is the Official Baseball Historian for Major League Baseball and the author of numerous books including Baseball in the Garden of Eden: The Secret History of the Early Game and Total Baseball: The Official Encyclopedia of Major League Baseball.

Review :
"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 Winner of the Casey Award: Best Baseball Book of the Year --Spitball: The Literary Baseball Magazine "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