1854.15

Sacramento "Hombres" Play Ball Before Several Hundred, Break Stuff

Salience	Noteworthy
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Location	CaliforniaCalifornia
City/State/Country:	[[{{{Country}}}]]
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Text	"A Game of Ball - People will have recreation occasionally, whether it be considered exactly dignified or not. Yesterday afternoon there was a game of ball played on J street which created no little amusement for several hundred persons. The sport lasted a full hour, until finally some unlucky hombre sent the ball through the window of a drug store, penetrating and fracturing a large glass jar, much to the chagrin of the gentlemanly apothecary, who had not anticipated such unceremonious a carronade." Daily Democratic State Journal (Sacramento CA), March 24, 1854. Posted to 19CBB (date lost) by Richard Hershberger. Richard adds: "Of course this raises the usual questions of what "a game of ball" means. Clearly it is a bat-and-ball game, and given the documented earlier games of baseball (in some form or other) in California and the absence of documented references of the other usual suspects such as wicket in California, it is a reasonable guess that this was baseball. I am less willing to make the leap to its being the New York game."
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