By Kim J. Harmon

Wouldn’t it be a perfect world if the new baseball season opened with first baseman Cap Anson stepping up to the plate against Al Spalding? Ray Shaw of Newtown sure thinks so.

Ever since discovering (or should that be re-discovering?) vintage base ball, he has fallen in love with the game the way it used to be played and his goal is to bring that game to Newtown in time for the Tercentennial celebration next August.

“When I saw it the first time, I knew this was the sport for me,” said Shaw, who owns a packaging design firm in Newtown. “The guys get dirty and have a lot of fun.”

Vintage base ball (that’s right – two words) is played by 19th century rules and customs. Ballists will wear period uniforms and attempt to recreate the game the way guys like Cap Anson (.331 career hitter), Al Spalding (252-65 career won-loss record), Candy Cummings (145-94), Levi Meyerle (.492 average in 1871, the highest ever recorded) and Jim O’Rourke (who played for the Mansfield, Connecticut team in 1872) played 130 years ago.

Of course, the game of base ball in the 19th century – although still familiar – was considerably different than the one fans are familiar with now. For instance, ballists played with bare hands until the 1880s and batters (or strikers, as they were known) were allowed to call their pitch. And through the 1860s, balls caught on one bounce were considered out.

It had been the accepted wisdom that Abner Doubleday invented the game of base ball back in 1839 after watching a group of kids playing a game of bat and ball in a field in upstate New York. But it was actually Alexander Cartwright and the Knickerbocker Base Ball Club that set down the first rules of the game in 1845 – setting the base paths at 90 feet, establishing foul territory, and formulating the basic tenets of the game (see related sidebar).

In 1858, the National Association of Base-Ball Players was formed. Eleven years later, the Cincinnati Red Stockings – led by George and Harry Wright – became the first openly professional team and barnstormed the country.

In 1871, the National League (then known as the National Association) began play with teams in Philadelphia (21-7), Chicago (19-9), Boston (20-10), Washington (15-15), New York (16-17), Troy (13-15), Fort Wayne (7-12), Cleveland (10-19) and Rockford (4-21). James “Deacon” White of Cleveland doubled for the first hit in the first game of the first professional league and the rest – as they say – was history.

It is a bygone era – one that many people are hoping to recreate.

Like Ray Shaw.

His wife works part-time at the Cyrenius Booth Library and since head librarian Janet Woycik is on the Tercentennial Committee, Ray happened to mention the concept of vintage base ball and how it could apply to the Tercentennial. The Hartford Senators are, perhaps, the leading vintage base ball team in Connecticut and every year they hold a tournament to coincide with the annual Riverfest.

This year, the tournament will be held July 2 through July 4 at Bushnell Park and Trinity College in Hartford. More than 200 players representing more than a dozen clubs from New York, New Jersey, Massachusetts, Rhode Island and Connecticut will participate.

Now, Ray isn’t looking for a tournament … just a game.

And he wants a Newtown team to play it. Sure, the Hartford Senators and Providence Grays have already agreed to come down and play a game (most likely at Fairfield Hills), but it is Ray’s goal that a Newtown team – and possibly two – would play.

“I’d like to see if there are some guys who would like to go out and give it a shot,” said Ray. “When guys on the Hartford Senators started playing, they never played softball again. This game was so much fun.”

But it would entail a little bit more than simply leaving your glove at home.

“If we’re going to do it right,” Ray said, “we need to get them in uniform.”

The cost of a shirt, pair of pants and ball cap would run only about $120 and Ray will be looking into possible ways of offsetting some of that cost through business donations and monetary support from vintage companies. The Vintage Base Ball Factory is an online source for the kind of equipment needed to outfit a team looking to play a little 19th-century baseball.

To give interested players a closer look at the game (besides visiting places like www.vbba.org, wwwhartfordvintagebaseball.com, www.vbbf.com or www.19thcenturyonly.com on the web), Ray will be looking to put together a small display (possibly at the library) of vintage base ball equipment and numerous pictures he has taken at tournaments in Hartford and Old Bethpage, New York. A meeting will also likely be called for April or May for anyone interested in playing in the game.

“It would be a lot of fun,” said Ray. “In Old Roxbury, they have a tournament where if fans show up in period garb, they get in free and teams are transported in by train. Maybe we could do something like that, say transport the players in by horse and carriage.”

Anyone looking to get a first hand look at vintage base ball can stop in at the fifth annual Hartford Vintage Base Ball Invitational, which will be held the weekend of July 4 at Bushnell Park in Hartford.

Sponsored by the Vintage Base Ball Factory, games will be held on two large fields at Bushnell Park and on the baseball field at Trinity College. Some 12 to 16 clubs will participate (using 1871 and 1886 era brackets), but more clubs are welcome.

Admission will be free. Each club should play three to four games, plus a championship game for those teams that qualify (the two best clubs in each bracket will advance to Sunday championship). Games will be 11 am to 8 pm on Friday and Saturday (festival events on Saturday include a downtown fireworks show).

Previous Hartford tournaments have attracted clubs from Connecticut Ohio, Michigan, New York, New Jersey, Rhode Island and Massachusetts and a combined 20,000 spectators. More than 200 ballplayers are expected to participate.

Bushnell Park will include a 19th century inspired ball field, concessions and baseball card/memorabilia dealers.

Anyone interested in getting an even sooner look at vintage base ball can see the Hartford Senators take on the Providence Grays on May 5 in Canton. The Senators will also play the Middletown Mansfields on May 19 in Middletown and then the Grays again on May 31 (in Willimantic), June 8 (in Providence, Rhode Island) and June 23 in Pawtucket, Rhode Island).

Visit the Senators at www.geocities.com/hsenators.

Other area tournaments this spring and summer include the New York/New Jersey Cup on Sunday, April 25, at the Old Bethpage Restoration Village in Old Bethpage, New York. Hosted by the New York Mutuals, there will be four games with four clubs, using 1876 rules for a championship. Games will start at 11 am and 1:30 pm with two fields being used. Admission is $6. Visit oldbethpage.org on the web.

Then there is the Northampton 350th Anniversary Festival in Northampton, Massachusetts, on Saturday, June 12, at Look Memorial Park in Northampton. Sponsored by the Hartford Senators, games will be played in their entirety. Rules will be from 1871 and 1886. Admission is free. Visit www.gavettenet.com on the web.

The National Silver Ball Tournament will be held Friday, July 30, through Sunday, August 1, in Mumford, New York. Hosted by the 1876 Silver Base Ball Park League, games will be held at Genesee Valley Park in Rochester and Silver Base Ball Park in Mumford. Some 16 men’s and four women’s clubs are expected to participate with a total of 38 games using the 1867, 1869, 1873, 1875, and 1876 rules. Games will be 12:30 pm to 5:45 pm on Friday, 9 am to 5:45 pm on Saturday, and championship game on Sunday at 1 pm. Visit www.gcv.org on the web.

Base Ball In Newtown

It is unclear if base ball was being played in Newtown back in the infancy of the game, but there was certainly 19th-century base ball being played locally. Very extensive stories going over nearly every nuance of the game were reported in The Newtown Bee.

This report on a game between the “Hops” and the “Sodas” at Cady Mountain was reported in the August 10, 1894 issue –

It was a great game of ball, that between two local nines, the “Hops” and the “Sodas,” back of Cady Mountain, one day this week. There were only two innings, but the winning score was high and the time, including the intermissions, was long.

It began shortly after 11 am and ended with the dusky shadows that came slanting down at evening. But in that time was crowded a high old time and no mistake. The sides were apparently matched, both teams having a “professional” ball player in its ranks, and umpired by three at different stages of the game.

This triangular board served as a sort of arbitration committee to settle the disputes which arose unavoidably in this unique game. Even then the decisions were not entirely satisfactory to all contestants. Are they ever?

The Sodas went to the bat and occupied all the time to the first intermission, retiring with the comfortable score of 13, nine of which were home runs and the balance by stolen bases, while the ball was caveering over the fields in wild throws of the Hops, who were rattled early in the game.

Finally, “Lakejorg,” the pitcher, seized the ball, and rushed for second base, arriving there just as the batter had left it; but in the ardor of the game, or fearful that the third baseman would not stop his hot liners, he did not throw to third but chased the would be scorer, but missed him by an inch …

So, who is up for a game of base ball?