1844.15

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Whigs 81, Loco Focos 10 in "Political" Contest

Salience Noteworthy
City/State/Country: Ogdensburg, NY, US
Game Bass Ball
Immediacy of Report Contemporary
Age of Players Adult
Text

"A matched, political game of bass Ball came off in this village on Friday last.  Twelve Whigs on one side, and twelve Loco Focos on the other.  Rules of the game, one knock and catch out, each one out for himself, each side one inns.  The Whigs counted 81 and the Locos 10.  The game passed off very pleasantly, and our political opponents, we must say, bore the defeat admirably."

Note: The Whigs were a major political party in this era, and the Loco Focos were then a splinter group of the opposing Democratic Party.

Sources

Frontier Sentinel [Ogdensburg, NY], April 23, 1844, page 3, column 1.

Comment

The Frontier Sentinel was published 1844-1847 in Ogdensburg (St. Lawrence County) NY.

Ogdensburg [1853 population "about 6500"] is about 60 miles [NE] down the St. Lawrence River from Lake Ontario.  It is about 60 miles south of Ottawa, about 120 miles north of Syracuse, and about 125 miles SW (upriver) of Montreal.  Its first railroad arrived in 1850.

The HOF's Tom Shieber, who submitted this find, notes that this squib may just be metaphorical in nature, and that no ballplaying actually occurred.  But why then report a plausible game score? 

 

 

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Query

Comment is welcome on the meaning of the three cryptic rule descriptions for this 12-player game.

[1] "One knock and catch out?"  Could this be taken to define one-out-side-out innings?  Or, that ticks counted as outs if caught behind the batter? Or something else?

[2] "Each one out for himself?"  Could batters continue in the batting order until retired?  That, then, might imply the use of an all-out-side-out inning format

[3] "Each side one inns?"  The Whigs made 81 "counts" in a single inning? 

Richard Hershberger asks if the first two rules are to be conjoined: "One knock and catch out, each one out for himself."  That would simply declare that caught fly balls (and, possibly, caught one-bound hits) were to be considered outs; but were there actual games for which such catches would not be considered outs?   

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Submitted by Tom Shieber, 4/24/2015



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