baseball
Americans began playing baseball on informal teams, using local rules, in the early 1800s. By the 1860s, the sport, unrivaled in popularity, was being described as America's "national pastime."
Alexander Joy Cartwright (1820-1892) of New York invented the modern baseball field in 1845. Alexander Cartwright and the members of his New York Knickerbocker Base Ball Club, devised the first rules and regulations for the modern game of baseball.
Baseball was based on the English game of rounders. Rounders become popular in the United States in the early 19th century, where the game was called "townball", "base", or "baseball". Cartwright formalized the modern rules of baseball.
The first recorded baseball game in 1846 when Alexander Cartwright's Knickerbockers lost to the New York Baseball Club. The game was held at the Elysian Fields, in Hoboken, New Jersey. In 1858, the National Association of Base Ball Players, the first organized baseball league was formed.
1845: Alexander Cartwright published a set of baseball rules for the Knickerbocker Club of New York, and his rules were widely adopted. 1869: The Cincinnati Red Stockings became the first openly-salaried team and are thus considered the first professional team. 1871: The first professional baseball league, the National Association of Professional Base Ball Players, was established. 1876: The first major league, the National League, was formed. 1878: Frederick Winthrop Thayer of Massachusetts (captain of the Harvard University Baseball Club) received a patent for a baseball catcher's mask on February 12.
- Baseball Almanac is filled with awards, records, stats, quotes, feats, facts and a book full of baseball history
- The National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum located in Cooperstown, New York. A shrine to baseball's greatest players, the Hall of Fame is committed to
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