While vacationing in Detroit recently, and visiting Greenfield Village, I had an opportunity to watch part of a baseball game unlike any I had ever seen.
The game, between two local teams, was played as it would have been in the 1860s.
There were no gloves, no bunting, no sliding, no cursing and no spitting.
In 1867 the job of the pitcher was to get the ball in play by pitching the ball “fairly for the striker” close to the center of home base and where the batsman requested it, according to the program handed out at the game.
However, pitchers tried changing the speed and angle of their pitches to lessen the effectiveness of the batsman.
Pitchers delivered the ball underhand with a straight arm, for ‘the ball must be pitched, not jerked or thrown,’ to the striker.
The striker, or batter, had to place one foot on a line, which was 12 inches from the plate, so as to allow the pitcher a chance to pitch over the plate. He was considered a striker unti he hit a fair ball.
From baseball’s earliest written rules, if the striker swung at a pitch and missed, it was a strike. Thee strikes meant an out. A more recent rule allowed called strikes, also. If the striker did not swing at a hittable pitch, the umpire would give him a warning. After a warning. the umpire would begin to call stikes. Three strikes after the warning was an out.
In 1867, a new rule was introduced. Just as he might warn the striker and call strikes, if fair pitches were not swung at, the umpire now after a warning to the pitcher, could call balls, also. After the warning to the pitcher, “ball to the bat” three more unfair pitches were ruled a base on balls or a walk.
Balls that were hit and landed fair, but rolled into foul territory, were fair balls and in play.
Early rules stated that a ball caught on the fly or on the first bounce put the striker out.
In the early days, of baseball, fielders were almost exclusively bare-handed. By 1867, howerver, the game was getting more competitive and balls were wound tighter and harder. As a result, the use of gloves was becoming more common.
However, gloves of the period were merely fingerless leather gloves worn on both hands. Players not only had to deal with the difficulty of throwing a ball with a glove on their throwing hand, but were also derided by their teammates and opponents for stooping to the unmanly tactic wearing gloves.
However, enough chose to deal with those issues rather than suffer the pain catching a daisy cutter bare-handed to make the use of gloves fariry commonon the World Tournament of Baseball

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