2004-8-8
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VOICE ONE:
Welcome to THIS IS AMERICA, in VOA Special English. I'm Steve
Ember.
VOICE TWO:
And I'm Gwen Outen. This week on our program -- baseball and
American culture.
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VOICE ONE:
The game is traditionally known as
America's national pastime. The men who play it professionally are
"the boys of summer." Baseball is considered part of the American
spirit. Books, songs, movies, plays, poems and lots of baseball
terms have become part of the American experience.
An exhibit called "Baseball as America" is currently on show at
the National Museum of Natural History in Washington, D.C. It
contains more than five-hundred historical items. Most come from the
National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum in Cooperstown, New York.
Many people believe that baseball first started in this small town
in eighteen-thirty-nine.
VOICE TWO:
In nineteen-oh-five, a committee was appointed to study the
history of baseball. It was called the Mills Commission. Three years
later, the Mills Commission reported its findings. The report
declared that a Civil War hero named Abner Doubleday invented
baseball in Cooperstown.
Evidence collected by the commission showed that Doubleday
modernized what started as a game of catch with as many as fifty
players. The evidence showed that he reduced the number of players,
added bases and created a playing area in the shape of a diamond.
No one knows for sure exactly how baseball began. But a copy of
the commission report can be seen in the exhibit at the Natural
History Museum. So can one of the first baseballs used by Abner
Doubleday. The ball was found in a farmhouse near Cooperstown in
nineteen-thirty-four.
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VOICE ONE:
Organized professional baseball started with the National League.
Teams formed this league in eighteen-seventy-six.
Baseball was supposed to stand for American beliefs like equality
and the chance to succeed. But the sport was representative of
society at the time. The National League was for white players only.
By eighteen-eighty-eight, more than sixty black players were on
minor league teams. Barred from the National League, black players
joined what were called the Negro Leagues. Teams began to appear in
black communities throughout the country.
VOICE TWO:
The unofficial ban against black players in the National League
lasted seventy years.
World War Two and the civil rights
movement in the United States helped end the racial divisions in
professional baseball. Jackie Robinson became the first black player
to break the color barrier. The Brooklyn Dodgers accepted him to
their team in nineteen forty-seven. Soon, other black players began
to join major league teams.
The "Baseball as America" exhibit includes a shirt, hat and glove
that Jackie Robinson wore as a Brooklyn Dodger. Also included is an
example of the hundreds of death threats and hate letters that he
received.
Blacks were not the only group excluded. Hispanic and Japanese
players were also among those rejected.
Yet white Americans were not the only ones who enjoyed baseball.
The museum exhibit includes baseball equipment used by
Japanese-Americans held at an interment camp during World War Two.
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VOICE ONE:
In nineteen-ten President William Howard Taft started a custom.
President Taft threw out the first pitch on opening day of the
baseball season that year. Almost every president since then has
continued the tradition of the opening day pitch.
Signed baseballs thrown by Presidents Warren Harding, Herbert
Hoover, Calvin Coolidge and Dwight Eisenhower as part of the
exhibit. So are baseballs thrown by Lyndon Johnson, Richard Nixon,
Jimmy Carter and the first President George Bush.
VOICE TWO:
On December seventh, nineteen-forty-one, Japanese forces launched
a surprise attack on the American Navy base at Pearl Harbor, Hawaii.
As a result, the United States entered World War Two.
The baseball season was suspended after the attack. Five weeks
later, the head of Major League baseball asked President Franklin
Delano Roosevelt if the season should continue. The president said
yes. He wrote the baseball commissioner that the game was a way to
raise American spirits.
That letter from President Roosevelt is part of the "Baseball as
America" exhibit. Other items from World War Two include objects
from the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League. This
league was formed to help keep American spirits high during the war.
At that time, some of baseball's most famous male players were away
as pilots and soldiers.
The war ended in nineteen-forty-five. The women's league ended in
nineteen-fifty-four after it lost popularity.
VOICE ONE:
Major League baseball postponed games for one week after the
terrorist attacks of September eleventh, two-thousand-one. Several
weeks later, a New York City firefighter discovered a baseball in
the ruins of the World Trade Center. That ball is also in the
"Baseball as America" exhibit at the Natural History Museum in
Washington.
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VOICE TWO:
Baseball and a similar game, softball, are among the first sports
that American children learn to play. Many children compete on teams
through Little League programs.
Boys and girls can play together
on Little League teams. Little League Baseball began to accept girls
in nineteen-seventy-four as a result of court action. That year,
Little League also established a softball program. Girls and boys
can play either baseball or softball, but most girls choose
softball.
There are more than seven thousand Little League programs in more
than one hundred countries around the world.
VOICE ONE:
Children between the ages of five and eight often play a game
called T-ball. T-ball is similar to baseball. However, the ball is
not thrown to the hitter. Instead, the ball sits on a stick called a
tee.
The "Baseball as America" exhibit includes pictures of T-ball
games on the grounds of the White House. Games take place there each
month during the baseball season, which runs from April to October.
President Bush started this tradition three years ago. Before he
entered politics, he owned part of the Texas Rangers baseball team.
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VOICE TWO:
Ten years ago, Major League baseball players went on strike over
pay and other issues. Part of the nineteen-ninety-four season and
all the championship games that year were cancelled. The start of
the nineteen-ninety-five season was delayed.
When play finally began, many people had lost interest. They
thought players earned too much and cared too little about the fans.
Public support for baseball was at an all-time low.
VOICE ONE:
The national pastime worked hard to save itself from becoming a
game past its time. In nineteen-ninety-eight a homerun race between
two players helped renew interest in baseball. That year Mark
McGwire and Sammy Sosa each broke the record for the most homeruns
in one season.
In nineteen-twenty-seven Babe Ruth set a record with sixty
homeruns. That record stood for more than thirty years, until Roger
Maris hit sixty-one.
Sammy Sosa finished the nineteen-ninety-eight season with
sixty-six homeruns. Mark McGwire had seventy. Now, their bats and
the bats of Babe Ruth and Roger Maris are all part of "Baseball as
America."
VOICE TWO:
The exhibit closes October third at the National Museum of
Natural History in Washington. But it will travel to other American
cities through two-thousand-six. Internet users can find out more on
the Web at baseballasamerica.org.
VOICE ONE:
Our program was written by Jill Moss and produced by Caty Weaver.
I'm Steve Ember.
VOICE ONE:
And I'm Gwen Outen. Join us again next week for another report
about life in the United States on the VOA Special English program,
THIS IS AMERICA.
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