Reconsidering Elysian Fields -- October 2022
Protoball is opening a page on the state of knowledge about Elysian Fields and its influence on the evolution of base ball. Irwin Chusid and Jon Popovich have expressed strong interest in writing further about Elysian Fields, and will participate in this limited-term discussion. For a riveting presentation on Elysian Fields from a base ball researcher's point of view, see Irwin and Jonathan's recent Youtube presentation at:
As something of a time-limited experiment in supporting current Origins research, we plan to resume the stimulating e-mail discussion of new research on the role of Elysian Fields in the evolution of ball-playing that Peter Mancuso initiated a couple of months ago. That group included several of our best-informed authors and observers. Irwin and Jon will participate.
Some issues that seem likely to be covered include:
[] A. Aspects of the role of Elysian Fields that we wish we knew more about. Possible example: what does EF tell us about the role of unavailable local playing grounds in the diffusion of base ball?
[] B. Favorite sources of existing coverage of ballplaying at Elysian Fields for those who want to read up (or refresh their grasp) of current knowledge on Elysian Fields.
[] C. Other factors ("threads") that we haven't thought of at this point.
While the main fun may well be in the e-mail exchanges that ensue, Protoball will import material from the discussion on this page for the benefit of future Origins researchers.
-- Larry McCray, 9/30/2022
Note: By accident, an active email discussion among a smaller group broke out on September 29. Here are the 12 postings so far : we will next expand the conversation to a larger group.
Current Protoball Thread on EF and the Lack of Manhattan Playing Space
Our projected book is about the totality of the EF, with base ball one of many aspects to be addressed. My sense of Protoball's involvement is to aggregate facts (journalistic and visual) about base ball, cricket, and other ball games being played at the EF, but not to delve into the history of the parkland, which pre-dates what we know as base ball. The fields were developed by Col. John Stevens as a public amusement area in the late 1820s and early 1830s. At the time of Col. Stevens' death in 1838, I suspect he had never heard of base ball.
Irwin
8.01 Irwin Chusid 10/3
- Referencing Tom's comment above — but did that apply in 1843–1846 when Hoboken became the go-to destination for countless NYC teams? Clearance for Central Park began around 1857, by which time "upper" Manhattan was being developed. Perhaps by that point there were more open spaces than there had been twenty years earlier. Brooklyn, by then, also offered more available grounds. In the 1860s, the opening of the Union and Capitoline grounds drew teams away from Hoboken. After the Civil War, the Elysian Fields went into decline and fewer NY-based teams played there.
Picnic Season, 1873: This early summer number of the popular illustrated weekly Daily Graphic provides a handy key to New York’s garden spots for excursions—even after the opening of Central Park. Steamboat excursions up the Hudson or ferry rides across it had been popular for decades. By 1873 the Elysian Fields of Hoboken were in decline as commercial interests had gobbled up much of the former workingman’s paradise. But now he had Fort Lee and good old Jones’ Wood, the spot rejected as the site of Central Park but still popular for German turnvereins, Caledonian games, and good rowdy fun of the sort depicted here by Jules Tavernier. The Daily Graphic was one of many illustrated weeklies popular at the time—Harper’s Weekly, Leslie’s, Police Gazette and more—but it was notable for its focus on city affairs and historic for its launch in 1880 of photomechanical engraving, the halftone process by which photographs might be reproduced. Within twenty years engraving would go the way of the dodo.
Yorkville was also the site of a baseball grounds, cited in Peverelly as being, in 1859, at Eighty-first street and Second avenue.
The last, I promise. I sent this to the 19cbb list on Sept 6, 2004, with a header of Pre-1871 NYC, Brooklyn, Philadelphia, and NJ Ball Grounds:
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Learning More about Elysian Fields: Some Favorite Starting Points
[] Gilbert, Thomas, How Baseball Happened (David R. Godine, Boston, 2020) pages 81-102.
[] Mann, William A., "Elysian Fields of Hoboken, New Jersey", Base Ball, vol. 1, no. 1, Spring 2007, pp 78. - 102.
[] Popovich, Jonathan and Irwin Chusid, 2022 webinar on Elysian Fields,
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=cwJGWeWDHPA [] Thorn, John, , "The Cauldron of Baseball,'Baseball in the the Garden of Eden, (Simon and Shuster, 2011, pages 85-104.
[] John Thorn, "The Cauldron of Baseball,'Baseball in the the Garden of Eden, (Simon and Shuster, 2011, pages 85-104.
Got another favorite source? Let Larry know. Would it be helpful to assemble an EF bibliography for this list? Let him know.
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Added 10/2022:
For comment and correction
L. McCray, 10/25
Version1.0,10/22/2022
As of October 2022, Protoball.org's PrePro Database includes about 200 contributed game accounts for New Jersey's Elysian Fields. A not-very thorough 3-hour/4-hour review of these data points leads to these rough impressions:
[] From late 1845 to 1853, most games were intramural contests among the Knickerbockers; over 100 such games are entered. I see only six games involving other clubs before 1853, two of which were intermural games for other clubs (Gothams in 1845, NYBBC in 1845). For this period, I see only 4 interclub games at EF, three in 1845-6 and one in in 1851 (K's v. Gothams).
Starting in 1853, the majority (roughly 90%) of 80 reported games) are interclub games.
[] Overall, 30 or 31 different clubs played at EF.
For interclub matches, the Eagle Club played in 34 of the listed games against 10 different opponents, starting in 1854. The Gotham/Washington/NYBBC club/clubs appeared in 25 interclub matches against 4 clubs from 1845 to 1861. The Knickerbocker Club appears in 22 interclub matches from 1845 to its last in August 1859. The Empire Club appears in 18 matches starting in 1854. The Mutual Club appears in 14 matches from 1858. Other matches featured the Eckford (9 games), the Excelsior (8), and the Alpine 9 (6) clubs (6). One account reported on two teams from a fire company.
[] Now. Aren't the Eckford (9 matches) , Excelsiors (8 matches) and Atlantic (two matches) and Enterprise (2 matches) all from Brooklyn? -- I think they only played non-Brooklyn opponents at EF. Maybe they had been invited by Manhattan club hosts? Are there any other distant visitors? Well, The Albany Knickerbockers do appear once (1864). A Hoboken club is seen twice, playing the Ecks and the Eagles in 1859.
[] A total of23 EF matches appear for 1860, 14 for 1861, and only 8 after that, the last in 1864. EF may have lost its tasted for crowds of fans in the later 1860s?
[] We have no reported matches for 1852, after only 6 in 1851. Cholera? Protoball data fumble? Other? Covid19?
Open issues:
Reminder: 'This is all just bean-counting -- it is not science. We have no reason to believe that matches entered in PBall are a representative sample of the matches actually played.
[] Would won-loss data be useful for our purposes? Not sure why it would.
[] Did other writers' write summaries that better meet our needs on this subject? (Feel free to suggest --or to perform --such!)
Larry M