Abner Doubleday is routinely touted
as the inventor of baseball, but there is little, if any historical
evidence to back that claim. Much like Betsy Ross and the flag,
Doubleday had a good story which circumvented the truth. When
baseball started getting really popular, there was actually a
committee called the Mills Commission organized with the purpose of
tracking down the origins of the sport.
One of the men on that commission, Albert Spalding, did not like the
fact that baseball was seen as a variation on the English game of
rounders. He wanted this new beloved pastime to be 100% American and
Doubleday’s story fit the bill perfectly. He had a decorated Civil
War general who created the sport in his youth living in a small
town in New York. And so the legend began. . .