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fVU511V VI/ ug [UI/UVA uu UiV MIO W,flag of his country*tt1Dr1fsL*SeBase Balls by the Million. ^ . • ■“How many base balls are used up inthe United States in the course of aoilyear ?“How do you expect me to answer a question like that ?** asked the base hall manager. “Up in the hundreds of-thousand3,1 should think. Nearly all of them are made in Philadelphia and Natick, Massachusetts. Two great concerns in thoce cities .urn them out and other Arms buy from them, printing their own trademarks on the covers. Ail the league clubs get their balls for nothing, the advertisement they give to a brand by using it being considered an equivalent. This is au important item, inasmuch as half a dozen base balls are often destroyed in a single game.’*“How are base balls made ?”“They are made by girls. Tf you will dissect a base ball you will find that its internal structure is quite elab-[. orate. Around a spherical cone of the [. best rubber is carefully wrapped a ear-$ tain amount of yarn. When the ball has thus grown to about two-thirds of ,e | the size it is to be, a leather cover is stitched on with a needle and waxed thread. Then more yarn is wound upon it until it is found to turn thee scales at precisely the right point. Fi«! nally the outer cover of horse hide is sewn on, and the ball, after being stamped and again weighed to make g sure that it is just live ounces, is i. wrapped in a tinfoil and put iu a pasteboard box for market.’*“There were no such base balls in the oldeu times.’*“No ; the base ball of to-day was not invented until 1875. And, by the way, the iuventor never got a cent for his n- patent. Twenty years ago a ball was ® made with a core of leather strips one ounce in weight, wrapped with yarn and covered. This was found too live-bi ly, and so a little sphere of molded ^ rubber of finest quality was substituted fora core. The trouble with a ball e* thus made was that it could not be do-™ peuded on for any given degree of elasticity. No two balls would be just fr. alike in this respect, however carefully Ja they were constructed, and each par^ ticular ball varieJ from day to day, ac* ® cording as the weather was dry or *e, damp. The inner cover now employed has the effect of regulating the elasticity of the ball, at the same tint# er | keeping it compact and in shape.c;c;is1.'J'0;Cheap base balls are made of poor yam and rubber scraps pressed into a pulp, 63 j the lower grade being composed of nothing more than melted reronants ofils I rubber shoes.”They Kill, Bat Bo Not SmoiDB.® | The average Kaluli does not regard
Newspaper Details
Columbus Daily Herald
Columbus, Indiana, US
Mon, Mar 06, 1893
Page 1
Full Page
Clipped by
Anonymous
SC, USA 19 Mar 2020
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