A revised edition of a very successful 1983 work, "Touching Base" remains a standard work on the development of professional baseball in the first three decades of the twentieth century. The author and publisher should be commended for making this revision available in an inexpensive paperback edition.In this work Steven Riess, on the faculty of Northwestern University, explores the history of baseball--truly the national pastime in this era--as it became in the first part of the twentieth century the preeminent sporting activity in the United States. He notes that there are many myths about this sport that have informed our perspective on the rise of the sport, and seeks to explore how these arose and explodes or revises many of them.
Beginning with an excellent historiographical essay on the study of baseball history, much updated since the 1983 edition, Riess places the sport's history in the larger context of cultural studies in the United States and charts a course for its study as a significant factor during the Progressive era. He then moves on to explore the unique relationship between baseball and the fan, and the sport's relationship to deeply felt societal needs within the United States.
Thereafter Riess considers the relationships between professional baseball and urban politicos and the larger communities that they were a part of. This discussion revolves around several of the key questions that arose in the Progressive era. These include the siting and construction of baseball parks and the role of the public/private partnership in bringing them to fruition; the propriety of playing baseball games on Sundays and the repeal of "Blue Laws"; and the manner in which the game was promoted to the public by both the owners and the leaders of the larger community.
In each case, Riess focuses on examples drawn from Atlanta, New York, and Chicago. Certainly New York and Chicago are the two most significant major league cities of the era, although it would have been interesting to have seen more examples from places like Boston, St. Louis, and Philadelphia, each of which had two teams. Atlanta has an important place in this study because of its central role in minor league baseball with the legendary "Crackers." Again, additional experiences drawn from other stellar minor league cities of the Progressive era, such as those in the Pacific Coast League, would have broadened the study.
These are minor objections to be sure; this study is one of the most important ever to appear in sports history. It is a must read for anyone who seeks to understand the history of baseball and its relationship to larger American society. As such, it has taken an enormous stride beyond the usual historical treatments of baseball with their emphasis on exploits on the field and heroes of the diamond to ask and seek to answer fundamental questions about America culture and its development in the twentieth century.
