When Johnny Came Sliding Home: The Post-Civil War Baseball Boom, 1865-1870

Rating:
Summary: Excellent detailed account of baseball's early beginings.
Review: This book is a thoroughly researched account of the early days of baseball. Mr. Ryczek dutifully illustrates the exciting and often times painful transition of the sport from a loosely organized amateur pastime to an openly professional enterprise.

Rating:
Summary: The first extended treatment of an important era.
Review: With insight, clarity and wit, Ryczek surveys a neglected era of early baseball history, and shows how baseball at its highest levels was transformed from a reasonably polite pastime for amateurs into a rowdy sport dominated by professionals. This first book-length treatment of baseball's post-Civil War era is a must read for anyone who would understand the origins of the professional game.