Allen LaPrell, age 11, of Camden, N.J., for his question:
HAS BASEBALL BEEN AROUND A LONG TIME?
Baseball started in the United States in the mid 1800s, but historical evidence shows that Americans developed the game from an old English sport called "rounders." In spite of evidence, many people believe that baseball was invented in Cooperstown, N.Y., in 1839 by a man named Abner Doubleday.
People in England played rounders as early as the 1600s. Rounders, like baseball, involved hitting a ball with a bat and advancing around bases.
Although rounders resembled baseball, there were many differences beween the two games. Perhaps the main difference was the way in which fielders put out base runners. Fielders threw the ball at runners. If the ball hit a runner who was off base, the runner was out. This practice was called soaking or plugging runners.
American colonists in New England played rounders as early as the 1700s. They called the game by several names including town ball, the Massachusetts game and even base ball. Rules for the game appeared in books from time to time.
People usually played the game according to their local customs. The number of players on a side, the number of bases and the distance between them varied from place to place.
Americans gradually changed the game into baseball. One of the key points was replacing the practice of soaking runners with the resent practice of tagging them.
In 1906, major league officials appointed a commission to investigate the question of the game's origin. Many people told the commission that baseball developed from rounders. But the commission reported that Doubleday invented the game, basing its conclusion on a letter received from Abner Graves, who had been a boyhood friend of Doubleday's.
Historians now believe that Doubleday had little, if anything to do with baseball. They also point out that the game described by Graves included the practice of soaking runners.
A New York sportsman named Alexander Cartwright is called the father of organized baseball. In 1845, he started a club whose only purpose was playing baseball. Called the Knickerbocker Base Ball Club of New York, it was the first organization of its kind.
Cartwright wrote a set of baseball rules when he organized the club. These rules, together with rules added in 1848 and 1854, did much to make baseball the game it is today.
The 1845 rules set the distance between the bases at 90 feet and provided for nine players on each side. They contain the first known mention of the need to tag runners rather than soaking them.
The 1848 addition included the present day rule of tagging first base to put a batter out on a ground ball. The force out rule was added in 1854.
On June 19, 1846, the Knickerbocker Club met the New York Nine in the first baseball game between two organized teams. The game took place on the Elysian Fields in Hoboken, N.J. The New York Nine won the game 23 to 1.