Show crack of baseball bat Is heard in many lands even britain takes up our national game IN washington ashington baseball has invaded great brita n and the ancient reign 0 aa f cricket is reported to be threat faed ned scotland and england placed their first international game recently the scots winning an easy victory of 24 3 glowing gi owing interest in baseball in britain recalls the attempt of the boston and philadelphia teams to in traduce the game abroad CO 00 years ago fourteen games planed on british boil soil mere ft ere courteously attended but real enthus am mas w as still reserved for cricket matches the great american ganie game has wan dered tar far afield since 1839 when ab ner der doubleday Double dav laid out tie ti e world worlds s first d amond in a vacant lot at coop 14 1 Y says a bulletin from the national geographic society in both canada and cuba it Is the favorite outdoor sport th the wiry lit tie cubans make excellent players and many of our professionals are recruit ed chete they hae have ha ve adopted our slang together with the game and shout pie bol hot hobron fou bol hot with latin excitability in sonora mexico the stadium Is superseding the arena enthusiastic fans fill the bleachers at gual giamas guamas mas although bull fighting Is con tinned out of respect for tradition take game along wherever reNer americans have settled baseball Is placed the igorot boas of lu on are keen supporters of their local teams entering the harbor of lago I 1 ago pago samoa the first thing one sees through the palms along the shore Is an immaculate baseball diamond puerto rico and hawaii have their en thusia fans in soviet russ a american ambassador bullitt has or dered bats and balls from this coun try and two embassy nines are ready to show moscow how the game should be played een eien the deliberate east has learned to steal bates bases girls schools in china and turkey have their teams one writer describes a game he watched matched beside the fatima at the bat on the diamond of con stantin ople women s college japanese schools and universities soon adopted the game the intercol interpol Int ercol leggate contests are japan s world se ries the tile meiji shrine grounds tokyo a s largest stadium holds 80 and the crowd which gathers to watch baseda play kelo rivals the throng at a yale harvard football game pro has not yet reached ja pan so the sport which has replaced wrestling as the national game remains a purely amateur one it Is fitting that baseball should return to england because one of its immediate ancestors was the english game of the american version of was town ball or massachusetts ball a new eng land favorite town ball was played on a 60 foot square the p acher in the center and the batter standing in the middle of one s de teams varied from 14 to 20 players none ot of hom were assigned definite pos eions the result ng coffus on was bewildering to spectator and player alile alike devised by Dou doubleday bleda y for years school boys bos had played one old cat and its more complicated forms two old cat three old cat and four old cat abner Doubled ly a youth of cooperstown Coopers town N Y Is credited with combining these various games draw ing tup up a set of rules and selecting the name ef of baseball he ile devised the 90 foot diat diamond pond and specified the position of each prayer although bis his team con aisted of ele eleven eleen en men doubleday had little time for the game all eh he invented he ile entered anest est point shortly afterward and la ter fired the first shot from fort sum ter in answer to the confederate bom bir dment at gettysburg a statue commemorates his distinguished mil rail gitary service but america remembers him as the man who invented her na lional game the first baseball teams were or in ILI 1840 by the bocher club of new york they played on the elysian fields in hoboken then a popular summer resort for new dorks elite brooklyn philadelphia and baltimore soon formed teams but the game remained as amateur and aristocratic a sport as polo Is today baseball grew into a national game during the civil war when northern sold ers taught it to the men from the NN est and south in the same manner our arm es spread its popularity among other nations during the world war its universal appeal dates from the dawn damn of history throwing running and catching are as old as man greeks persians and norsemen Isor semen played handball the romans batted balls with a bandaged forearm the G I 1 bert islanders wrap coconut shells shell 3 with cord and hit them with an open palm archeologists in egypt found a leather co cohered ered ball over thirty cen old it Is stuffed with papyrus but the segments of its cover are sewn like those of a modern baseball |