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Date

2025

Abstract

The spread of baseball during the mid-nineteenth century is sometimes associated with soldiers and former soldiers who served during the US Civil War. This association is partly true in Colorado, Kansas, and Nebraska. However, white settlers from the Northeast and Midwest also brought baseball and similar ball games to the region before the Civil War began, and civilians played ball during the war. The first team organized in the region was the Denver Base Ball Club (BBC) in March 1862, although it disbanded as warmer weather permitted mining activity to resume. Increasing numbers of baseball clubs were organized in Colorado, Kansas, and Nebraska soon after the war ended, and tournaments were held for the championship of each state or territory by 1871. The Otoe BBC of Nebraska City and the Omaha BBC also hosted the first professional baseball team, the Cincinnati Red Stockings, in 1869. These and other aspects of baseball as it took root in Kansas, Colorado, and Nebraska are recounted. This essay was originally published in 2020 and has undergone revisions and corrections for its release in 2025 as part of the five-volume anthology Peeking through the Knothole. The open-access, digital version of this essay is available through the “Download” button on this webpage. The print-on-demand version is available through the “Buy this Book” button for volume one of the anthology (Essays on Baseball Origins in the West, 1858–1883).

Keywords

Colorado baseball, Kansas baseball, Nebraska baseball, Civil War baseball, silver baseball.

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Originally Published 2020

Revised Edition 2025

Baseball Takes Root in Kansas, Colorado, and Nebraska, Revised

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