1860c.27
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Playing of Hole-less Two-Old-Cat in Providence RI
Salience | Noteworthy |
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Tags | |
Location | New EnglandNew England |
City/State/Country: | Providence, RI, United States |
Modern Address | |
Game | Base BallBase Ball |
Immediacy of Report | Retrospective |
Age of Players | JuvenileJuvenile |
Holiday | |
Notables | |
Text | "Baseball, as now [in 1915] so popularly played by the many strong local, national and international "nines," was quite unheard of in my boyhood. To us . . . the playing of "two old cat" was as vital, interesting and captivating as the present so-well-called National Game. . . . Four boys made the complement for that game. Having drawn on the ground two large circles, distant about ten or twelve feet from each other in a straight line, a boy with a bat-or 'cat-stick,' as it was called - in hand stood within each of those circles; back of each of those boys was another boy, who alternately was a pitcher and catcher, depending upon which bat the ball was pitched to or batted from. If a ball was struck and driven for more or less distance, then the game was for the boys in the circles to run from one to the other a given number of times, unless the boy who was facing the batter should catch the ball, or running after it, should secure it, and, returning, place it within one of those circles before the prescribed number of times for running from one to the other had been accomplished; or, if a ball when struck was caught on the fly at close range, then that would put a side out. The boys, as I have placed them in twos at that old ball game, were called a side, and when a side at the bat was displaced, as I have explained, then the other two boys took their positions within the circles. It was a popular game with us, and we enjoyed it with all the gusto and purpose as does the professional ball player of these later days."
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Sources | Farnham, Joseph E. C., Brief Historical Data and Memories of My Boyhood Days in Nantucket Providence, R.I. (Snow & Farnham, 1915) pages 90-91. |
Warning | |
Comment | Farnham was born in 1849. This account seems to imply that some minimum number of crossings from base to base was required to avoid an out. Edit with form to add a comment |
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Source Image | [[Image:|left|thumb]] |
External Number | |
Submitted by | Mark Aubrey |
Submission Note | 6/13/2007 |
Has Supplemental Text |
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