Nineteenth Century Committee, SABR
Annual Report, 2001-2002

Nineteenth Century Committee

The Nineteenth Century Committee was founded in 1984 [no, 1982-1983] 
to recover the record of and to interpret baseball through 1900, both for 
ourselves and for the baseball public generally.
    John Husman resigned as Chairman this Winter, and Paul Wendt was
announced as his successor, February 1.  Paul was co-founder of the Boston
regional chapter, 1998-1999, and is turning his attention to the 19th
Century Committee this Summer, after focusing on SABR32 this Spring.
    We now have about 250 unofficial members, including all of last year's
committee members (180+) and all '19cBB' egroup members (130+).  The Chair
is at work on the multiple lists of persons and addresses.

There was one number of the newsletter, last July (Summer 2001).  The Chair
inherited several submissions and suggestions and will resume the newsletter
soon, probably alone, while recruiting help for the subsequent number.
Ideas abound but must be tied down.

Most Committee-sponsored activity in 2001-2002 was 19cBB activity.  19cBB is
a mutual distribution email list with some extra features available to
subscribers on the web, mainly an archive of past "Messages".  It was
founded last June and grew slowly with spurts in September and February.
There are about 140 subscribers, about half of them 2001 committee members,
the other half "obvious candidates".
    19cBB traffic includes occasional announcements and some discussion of
committee business such as what books to review and what projects to
undertake.  (Expect more of that next year.)  But most traffic concerns
baseball, from matters of narrow fact to matters of broad historical
interpretation.
    One highlight of 19cBB is the nearly continuous exchange on Early Base
Ball Rules and Practices, which is the subject of a Committee project led by
Chip Atkison.  There is also much on particular ballclubs and particular
locales, both before and beside the major professional leagues.
    Interest in early base ball has been stimulated this year by the awards
of the 2002 Seymour Medal to Thomas Melville and the two 2001
MacFarland-SABR Baseball Research Awards to Thomas Altherr and Robert
Schaefer, and by the electronic publications by David Block with SABR at
    http://sabr.org/htdocs/dcforum/DCForumID97/16.html#
    [links updated 2005 Jun 10]
Those electronic publications are:
David Block, "Baseball's Earliest Rules?" (2001), an interpretive article.
J.C.F. Guts Muth, "English Base-ball" (2001), a modern English translation
of the rules and description of the game, with images of two accompanying
figures, from the work of a physical education specialist (in German, 1796).

Two Committee projects continue, led by Chip Atkison (Early Rules and
Practices) and Jon Dunkle (American Association History).  According to late
report on the AA History Project, there has been a breakthrough in Brooklyn,
with several researchers now at work; Philadelphia is still the crying need.
Fred Ivor-Campbell (Publications) and Jim Tootle (Vintage Base Ball)
continue as Associate Chairs, in discussion with the Chair concerning
Committee goals in each area.

An email series on the 19th century work of other SABR research committees
has begun, with reports from the Spring Training and Minor League
Committees; several other reports have been solicited.  19cBB traffic
implies that some members are at work on "candidate projects" for the
Committee, so there will be much to discuss at SABR32 in Boston.

Paul Wendt, Chairman