Just as any traveler finds a trip more enjoyable with a good travel guide, anyone who really wants to get into baseball needs the Baseball America directory. Much more than a collection of names and phone numbers, the Directory continues to get better each year and has become a comprehensive guide to the game. Is baseball an important part of your business? You can find the decision-makers at every level and how to get in touch with them. Do you work in the game? There's no better way to keep up with friends and colleagues. Or are you a fan looking for some action? With our schedules and ballpark directions, you'll always be able to find a game. Find out for yourself why the Baseball America Directory is in so many briefcases and glove compartments. Book jacket.

Provides management, field staff, and contact information, league schedules, and ballpark directions for major and minor leagues.

The 2007 Baseball America Directory is the definitive reference guide for the upcoming season. The Directory features major, minor, and independent league schedules, ballpark directions, and how to get in touch with anyone in the game-by phone, fax or on the web. From schedules to personnel to addresses to phone numbers and websites, the Directory is the guide to finding information in baseball, from the majors to the minors to college, high school, and amateur baseball.

Provides contact information and schedules for major and minor leagues.

America loves sports. This book examines and details the proof of this fascination seen throughout American society—in our literature, film, and music; our clothing and food; and the iconography of the nation. This momentous four-volume work examines and details the cultural aspects of sport and how sport pervasively reflects—and affects—myriad aspects of American society from the early 1900s to the present day. Written in a straightforward, readable manner, the entries cover both historical and contemporary aspects of sport and American culture. Unlike purely historical encyclopedias on sports, the contributions within these volumes cover related subject matter such as poetry, novels, music, films, plays, television shows, art and artists, mythologies, artifacts, and people. While this encyclopedia set is ideal for general readers who need information on the diverse aspects of sport in American culture for research purposes or are merely reading for enjoyment, the detailed nature of the entries will also prove useful as an initial source for scholars of sport and American culture. Each entry provides a number of both print and online resources for further investigation of the topic.

West Virginia sprang into existence as a state in the midst of the Civil War, and "base ball," as it was called then, was close on the heels of statehood. A game in 1866 hosted by the Hunkidori Base Ball Club in Wheeling, is considered the first "match game of Base Ball." Some historians contend the game spread via the movement of soldiers who were from urban areas. The real roots of baseball are not the romantic image of rural boys in sandlots or lazy father-son afternoons. It was born and came of age as an urban sport, a social pursuit of well-heeled young men that in the early days often involved banquets and shows following each game. The author traces the history of minor league and independent league baseball in West Virginia. Baseball below the minor leagues has a rich and comparatively unexplored history, and West Virginia has made substantial contributions to this legacy. Chapters examine the chronological history of baseball and the larger economic and cultural changes that have influenced it. Eras include baseball as a social game (through 1873); the emergence of professional baseball (through 1895); its second boom (through 1905); the deadball era (through 1920); the Martinsburg dynasty (1914 to 1934); as a miners' sport (1920 to 1941); the Middle Atlantic League (1925-1942); the Mountain State League (1937-1942); the postwar years (1945-1955); the nadir (1955-1985); and "A Minor Miracle" (1985-2000), a chapter that heralds a comeback in the popularity of professional baseball.

Kraus examines the role played by minor league baseball in hundreds of cities and towns across the United States.