Creating the National Pastime

Rating:
Summary: Baseball history at its best
Review: Expensive yes. But every line is loaded with facts. The detail about Shoeless Joe is better than anywhere. Old time stadiums? No finer discussion. Baseball on the radio? What a great introduction to the subject.

This is a commanding book. You will read it if you start.

Rating:
Summary: Baseball history at its best
Review: Expensive yes. But every line is loaded with facts. The detail about Shoeless Joe is better than anywhere. Old time stadiums? No finer discussion. Baseball on the radio? What a great introduction to the subject.

This is a commanding book. You will read it if you start.

Rating:
Summary: Good general book for the baseball historian
Review: G. Edward White's book, Creating the National Pastime, examines the changes in major league baseball during the first half of the 1900's. The slow acceptance of radio, night baseball, black players, the rise of the commissioner's office, and the ironclad nature of the reserve clause are among the topics looked at in the book. The book does a good job examining some of the changes that took place between 1903 and 1953 in baseball that we take for granted today (night baseball, steel and concrete ballparks, etc.), but does get tedious at times with its wealth of somewhat arcane information. Overall, a pretty solid (if not always engrossing) read.

Rating:
Summary: Good general book for the baseball historian
Review: G. Edward White's book, Creating the National Pastime, examines the changes in major league baseball during the first half of the 1900's. The slow acceptance of radio, night baseball, black players, the rise of the commissioner's office, and the ironclad nature of the reserve clause are among the topics looked at in the book. The book does a good job examining some of the changes that took place between 1903 and 1953 in baseball that we take for granted today (night baseball, steel and concrete ballparks, etc.), but does get tedious at times with its wealth of somewhat arcane information. Overall, a pretty solid (if not always engrossing) read.