An Amish Moment
Amish books and Amish baseball. Amish are clearly having a moment… again. Continue Reading →
Tag: baseball
In the World Links: Lost & Found in Translation Edition
Nora Connor: In Poland, the Bhagavad Gita is now available in translation directly from Sanskrit to Polish, thanks to a “late-blooming” student’s doctoral dissertation. In Russia, an appeals court declines to ban the Gita as “extremist” religious literature. In time for Passover, check out the New American Haggadah, translated by Nathan Englander and edited by Jonathan Safran Foer… Continue Reading →
The House of David
An excerpt from Out of Left Field: Jews and Black Baseball (Oxford University Press, 2011) by Rebecca Alpert, from Chapter Four, The Conflict over Baseball Comedy.
A few independent white baseball teams also clowned and relied on novelty to gain bookings. The best known of these teams was the House of David. The team originated in 1916 within the Israelite House of David messianic Christian group based in Benton Harbor, Michigan. Like the only black Jewish team, the Belleville Grays, the House of David team began as a recreational activity for the community. They played well, and began to send out a touring team in 1919. The colony split in the 1930s, and both groups continued to promote traveling baseball teams, one of which continued through the 1950s. Many members of the community played, but they also welcomed outsiders, including major league baseball stars like Grover Cleveland Alexander and the female star Babe Didrikson, who was a well-known athlete in golf, basketball, and track and field. There were also many imitation House of David teams, including the Havana Cuban House of David organized by Jewish entrepreneur Syd Pollock. The original House of David once tried to take the imposters to court to protect their name, but there were simply too many imitators. Continue Reading →
Sunday's Wagon
By Daniel Okrent:
William Ashley Sunday of the Philadelphia Phillies, who became world-famous for loving Christ and hating alcohol, put away his glove, his bat, and his spikes in 1890. He had just completed a season in which he had stolen 84 bases and earned $3500, roughly nine times the wages of the average American industrial worker. But at last he had decided to turn away from the sporting life and toward Jesus, an inclination that had already set him apart from many of his teammates. Continue Reading →
Sunday’s Wagon
By Daniel Okrent:
William Ashley Sunday of the Philadelphia Phillies, who became world-famous for loving Christ and hating alcohol, put away his glove, his bat, and his spikes in 1890. He had just completed a season in which he had stolen 84 bases and earned $3500, roughly nine times the wages of the average American industrial worker. But at last he had decided to turn away from the sporting life and toward Jesus, an inclination that had already set him apart from many of his teammates. Continue Reading →
Playing for Him
So much for love of the game. Nicole Greenfield Baseball is a religious sport, there’s no doubt about it. During the course of a game, we see players mutter prayers Continue Reading →