Books on the early years of base ball

These are some of the books that have helped me begin to understand how the game of base ball was played and who was playing it in the early years of the game, especially the 1860s. Iam happy to loan these to any of my fellow ballists with Greenfield Village's Historic Base Ball program. Let me know if any of these interest you, and we can find a way to get the book to you. They are sorted by Author’s last name.

Control-Click the pictures to go to Amazon.com’s page for each book / Title / Author / Info / Razorback’s comments /
/ Baseball before We Knew It: A Search for the Roots of the Game / Block, David / * Paperback: 352 pages
* Publisher: Bison Books; 1 edition (March 1, 2006)
* ISBN-10: 0803262558
* ISBN-13: 978-0803262553 / When someone asks you “Where did baseball come from”, THIS is the book with the answers. It covers bat and ball games from the 1300s onward, and shows how they moved around the world.
/ Base Ball: The History, Statistics and Romance of the American National Game / Church, Seymour R. / This is essentially a re-print of a 1902 book that was a history of base ball from 1845-1871 (it was volume 1 of a 2-volume set in 1902, but the modern publisher was not able to find a copy of volume 2, and so did not re-print it.)
/ Honus Wagner: A Biography / DeValeria, Dennis; DeValeria, Jeanne Burke / * Paperback: 352 pages
* Publisher: University of Pittsburgh Press (March 19, 1998)
* ISBN-10: 0822956659
* ISBN-13: 978-0822956655 / Interesting biography of “The Flying Dutchman”, but tells more about the Pittsburgh Pirates than about Wagner himself. Only the last part really gives a sense of him as a person.
/ The Encyclopedia of Civil War Usage: An Illustrated Compendium of the Everyday Language of Soldiers and Civilians / Garrison, Webb B., Garrison, Cheryl / * Paperback: 288 pages
* Publisher: Cumberland House Publishing (February 1, 2002)
* ISBN-10: 1581822804
* ISBN-13: 978-1581822809 / Not a base ball book, but if you’re interested in how people actually spoke at the time, this is a great resource
/ A History of early baseball: Playing for keeps: 1857-1876 (Hardcover) / Goldstein, Warren / * Hardcover: 182 pages
* Publisher: Barnes & Noble Books (2000)
* ISBN-10: 0760720592
* ISBN-13: 978-0760720592 / A decent coverage of how our game went from a gentleman’s contest with honor being the primary goal, to a contest where winning (and the money that came with winning) mattered more.
/ The New Bill James Historical Baseball Abstract / James, Bill / [I have the 1988 edition, but this refers to the 2003 updated edition (which is now on my wish list!)
/ Baseball in Blue and Gray: The National Pastime during the Civil War / Kirsch, George B. / * Paperback: 168 pages
* Publisher: Princeton University Press (January 22, 2007)
* ISBN-10: 0691130434
* ISBN-13: 978-0691130439 / One of several books about how the Civil War helped to spread base ball through the country, though Kirsch’s conclusions are not universally accepted. Still, we get a lot of questions about how the war affected the game.
/ Spalding's World Tour: The Epic Adventure that Took Baseball Around the Globe - And Made it America's Game / Lamster, Mark / * Paperback: 320 pages
* Publisher: PublicAffairs (June 4, 2007)
* ISBN-10: 1586484338
* ISBN-13: 978-1586484330 / The first great attempt to spread base ball to the rest of the world, and all of the (mis)adventures that accompanied that effort.
/ A Game of Inches, Volume 2: The Stories Behind the Innovations That Shaped Baseball: The Game Behind the Scenes / Momrris, Peter / * Hardcover: 416 pages
* Publisher: Ivan R. Dee, Publisher (October 25, 2006)
* ISBN-10: 1566637058
* ISBN-13: 978-1566637053 / These two volumes are just about the best books ever on how every aspect of baseball came to be the way it is.
/ A Game of Inches, Volume 1: The Stories Behind the Innovations That Shaped Baseball: The Game on the Field / Morris, Peter / * Hardcover: 560 pages
* Publisher: Ivan R. Dee, Publisher (May 25, 2006)
* ISBN-10: 1566636779
* ISBN-13: 978-1566636773 / These two volumes are just about the best books ever on how every aspect of baseball came to be the way it is.
/ Baseball Fever: Early Baseball in Michigan / Morris, Peter / * Hardcover: 392 pages
* Publisher: University of Michigan Press/Regional (March 7, 2003)
* ISBN-10: 0472098268
* ISBN-13: 978-0472098262 / If you play base ball at Greenfield Village and haven’t read this book, then you really should read it. It is all about our game, in our era, in our state.
/ But Didn't We Have Fun?: An Informal History of Baseball's Pioneer Era, 1843-1870 / Morris, Peter / * Hardcover: 304 pages
* Publisher: Ivan R. Dee, Publisher (March 25, 2008)
* ISBN-10: 1566637481
* ISBN-13: 978-1566637480 / This book has a lot of reminiscences of early base ball players, and puts those memories in context of the game at the time.
/ Level Playing Fields: How the Groundskeeping Murphy Brothers Shaped Baseball / Morris, Peter / * Hardcover: 194 pages
* Publisher: University of Nebraska Press (April 1, 2007)
* ISBN-10: 0803211104
* ISBN-13: 978-0803211100 / Believe it or not, this is a really interesting book about early base ball grounds keepers, and the really important role they played in shaping the game.
/ Crazy '08: How a Cast of Cranks, Rogues, Boneheads, and Magnates Created the Greatest Year in Baseball History / Murphy, Cait N. / * Paperback: 400 pages
* Publisher: Collins (February 19, 2008)
* ISBN-10: 0060889381
* ISBN-13: 978-0060889388 / 1908 was truly a crazy season in baseball, and this book is really enjoyable in making that season seem like it is happening right now.
/ Glory of Their Times: Story of the Early Days of Baseball Told By the Men Who Played It / Ritter, Lawrence S. / Personal memoirs by great and (not so great) players from the late 1890s to the 1930s / The focus of this book is a little later than our era, but it is truly an excellent book – this is where my interest in baseball history started. I have the 1966 original edition, but an “enlarged edition” came out in paperback in 1992.
/ Early Innings: A Documentary History of Baseball, 1825-1908 / Sullivan, Dean A. (Editor), Rader, Benjamin G. (Introduction) / * Paperback: 326 pages
* Publisher: University of Nebraska Press (February 1, 1997)
* ISBN-10: 0803292449
* ISBN-13: 978-0803292444 / If you want to read the original documents (newspaper articles, contracts, league charters, rules, etc.), this is the book for you. It is a little short on explanatory text about those documents, but it’s interesting to read them.
/ Creating the National Pastime: Baseball Transforms Itself (1903-1955) / White, G. Edward / * Paperback: 384 pages
* Publisher: Princeton University Press (February 2, 1998)
* ISBN-10: 0691058857
* ISBN-13: 978-0691058856 / Decent book about the early part of the 20th century, when professional baseball with two major leagues and a cast of minor leagues took hold of the country.
/ The National Association of Base Ball Players, 1857-1870 / Wright, Marshall D. / * Paperback: 388 pages
* Publisher: McFarland & Company (April 2000)
* ISBN-10: 0786407794
* ISBN-13: 978-0786407798 / This has box scores, team performance summaries, hitting leaders – statistics galore – but not a lot of other information to help understand the era. So if you want to know that on July 15, 1867, the Athletic Club of Philadelphia beat the Tyrolean Club of Harrisburg, PA by a score of 118 to 11, then this is the book for you. If not, maybe give it a pass.