While hiding out at the bookstore at the Baseball Hall of Fame, I picked up two of the annual volumes of the Cooperstown Symposium. These are sets of essays on the history, myths, ethics and implications of baseball which were written in preparation for an annual baseball nerd convention held at Cooperstown every year. I would think this would be an excellent avenue for accessing what America is or thinks it is, one of my new favorite thunks. One cannot read just Anti-Federalists histories, you know.

While reading an essay last night about the games which pre-existed baseball (many of which simply appear to be baseball) there was review of a game called "trap ball" in which one batter hits to people waiting in the field. It sounds like in most versions the ball is one a stand like t-ball and the scoring is a bit odd, based on estimation of how far each guy could hit. But the core was that who ever scored best over a set time or number of hits then replaced the batter, the former batter cycling back out into the field in a never ending game. This is "500 Up" to me. When they speak of the beginning of baseball they mean the beginning of Team "X" versus Team "Y" and the beginnings of a schedule. The games had been played for centuries before on a pick-up basis. One French observer in the Revolutionary War noted in a letter that George Washington would play catch with other officers for hours.