Baseball During The Antebellum Era

During the antebellum era, Victorian culture was prominent. Victorian “morality” is commonly characterized by sexual restraint, self-control, low tolerance of crime, and a strict social code of conduct. Victorians, similarly to Puritans, believed in hard work. Despite the emphasis on hard work, recreations were still able to rise during the antebellum era. Two of antebellum America’s most popular sports, prizefighting and baseball, became popular sports in America a few decades before the Civil War. Their rise in prominence in American culture, however, came from two fundamentally different social phenomena.
Prizefighting
Despite being banned almost everywhere in the country, prizefighting became the most popular spectator sport in America

In the constitution of one early baseball club, it was stated that it would be the club’s objective to “advance morally, socially, and physically, the interests of its members” (Goldstein, 17). Victorians, however, worried that baseball would take away from work. The baseball fraternity insisted that baseball was compatible with Victorian values, as it encouraged self-control. The best ball clubs were said to be very disciplined and well trained (Goldstein, 22). Baseball required cooperation between teammates and success and depended on familiarity with the playing styles of teammates (Goldstein, 22). The skills required in early baseball were consistent with skills needed in work: discipline, skill, training, and specialization (Goldstein, 23). Several clubs were based in workplaces, including the Eckford Club of Brooklyn, which drew members from the shipyards (Goldstein, 24). Working men made up the majority of fraternity membership. Between 75 and 80 percent of the fraternity had occupations ranging from journeymen and clerks to master craftsmen and small shopkeepers (Goldstein, 25). Many of baseball’s best players were skilled craftsmen, with significant control over their work rhythms, allowing them to dedicate time to practice (Goldstein, 26). In a time when men felt the need to display “manliness,” baseball offered them a chance to take part in “healthful recreation”

Prizefighting provided an oppositional culture to the Victorian culture which became prominent during the antebellum era. Prizefighting became popularized as rivalries existing in the workplace were dramatized in the ring, with one side being able to prove superiority over another. The shift in the economic system, from one relying on skilled labor to one being driven by unskilled labor increased working tensions. Some men, followed the Victorian culture, focusing on restraining their impulses in order to increase productivity in the workplace to make profits. Others, however, opposed this cultural shift, and indulged in rough activities, such as prizefighting, and other Victorian-opposed activities such as drinking and gambling to let out frustrations about the workplace. Some of these men turned to the world of play to achieve success as an alternative to the static world of work. Early baseball, however, sought respectability from Victorians, and was not an alternative to work. Qualities needed for success in baseball, such as discipline, skill, training, and specialization, were also skills that were needed in the workplace. Baseball reinforced these traits. Many early baseball clubs were made up of working class men. Early baseball was a common diversion, played for pleasure, not for profit. While gatherings for prizefighting involved the need