Chronology:Barn Ball (House Ball)
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1835.4 A Ballplayer's Progress: "Bound and Catch," "Barn Ball," "Town Ball"
Game:
H. H. Waldo told the Mills Commission: "I commenced playing ball seventy years ago (1835). I was the only one in the game and it was called "Toss up and Catch," or "Bound and Catch." A few years later I played "Barn Ball." Two were in this game, one a thrower against the barn, and catcher on its rebound, unless the batter hit it with a club; if so, and he could run and touch the barn with his bat, and return to the home plate before the ball reached there, he was not out - otherwise he was.
"A few years later the school boys played what was called "Town Ball." That consisted of a catcher, thrower, 1st goal, 2nd goal and home goal. The inner field was diamond shape: the outer field was occupied by the balance of the players, number not limited. The outs were as follows: Three strikes," "Tick and catch," ball caught on the fly, and base runner hit or touched with the ball off from the base. That was sometimes modified by "Over the fence and out." [Note: this places Town Ball at about 1840 or so.]
Letter from H. H. Waldo, Rockford IL, to the Mills Commission, July 7, 1905.
Comment:
Hiram Hungerford Waldo (1827-1912) was born in Elba, Genesee County, NY. He moved to Rockford in 1846 and became a member of that city's Forest City BBC.
Year
1835
1841.15 New Orleans Reprints Article on Wicket, Barn Ball, Base
Location:
Game:
"Who has not played 'barn ball' in boyhood, 'base' in his youth and 'wicket' in his adulthood?"
Sources:
New Orleans Picayune, 1841. This cite is found in Tom Melville, The Tented Field: A History of Cricket in America (Bowling Green State U Press, Bowling Green, 1998), page 6. He attributes it, apparently, to Dale Somers, The Rise of Sports in New Orleans (LSU Press, Baton Rouge, 1972), page 48.
Warning:
It is not clear that this article reflects actual wicket play, or interest, in New Orleans in 1841.
The text appears have been 'borrowed' from a Cleveland paper: See 1841.17
However, 1844.13 shows that a New Orleans wicket club did call a meeting in 1844.
Comment:
Note: Melville is willing to identify the sport as the one that was played mostly in the CT-central and MA area . . . but it is conceivable that the writer intended to denote cricket instead?
From Bruce Allardise, December 2021: The original article is in the New Orleans Times Picayune, May 31, 1841, which references a reminisce in a {April 1841} Cleveland OH newspaper article. [bsa]
Query:
Do we have any other references to wicket in LA before 1844? Could the Picayune simply have copied an article from a distant newspaper.
Can we learn how broadly barn ball was played n the US? In other nations?
Year
1841