The New York Giants Base Ball Club

Though baseball would eventually come to embody the American spirit, in the nineteenth century onlookers regarded the game with some ambivalence. To capture the hearts of the public, baseball needed teams worth watching—and no team was a better ambassador for baseball in the 19th century than the New York Giants.
The pre–John McGraw Giants were occasionally very good and frequently very fashionable, but they had not yet become the trademark team of the National League that they would become in the early 20th century. The Giants were, however, one of the league’s premier teams simply because they played in the country’s premier city. New York and its Giants epitomized the rise of industrialized America and the need for organized spectator diversions. Together, the city and the team helped propel baseball into its position as the national pastime.

James D. Hardy, Jr., is a professor of history at Louisiana State University and has written numerous books on baseball. He lives in Baton Rouge.

James D. Hardy, Jr.
Format: softcover (6 x 9)
Pages: 251
Bibliographic Info: 16 photos, references, index
Copyright Date: 2006 [1996]
pISBN: 978-0-7864-2728-4
eISBN: 978-1-4766-1782-4
Imprint: McFarland

Preface      1

1. The American Game      5

2. The New Base-Ball Club      35

3. The Building Years      48

4. “We Are the People”      74

5. The Brotherhood War      92

6. An Attempt to Recover      134

7. Andrew Freedman      154

8. The Baseball Trust      171

9. Under New Management      192

Notes      199

Index      235

“excellent”—Nine; “wonderful”—SABR Bibliography Committee Newsletter.