From SABR Encyclopedia
| Spread of baseball: Home -> Wisconsin -> Early baseball in Wisconsin/Predecessor Game 2
|
| Location
| Wisconsin
|
| Year
| 1819
|
| City
| Prairie du Chien
|
| State
| WI
|
| Country
| US
|
| Name of game
| Town ball?? Base ball??
|
| Found by
| Dennis Pajot
|
From the Milwaukee Daily Sentinel in 1865:
"A Frenchman, Edward Beouchard, living at Mineral Point [in southwestern Wisconsin] fully confirms the scepticism we have expressed as to the great age of 139 years, claimed for Joseph Crele. He says he has known Crele for 40 years. In 1819, at Prairie du Chien [a southwestern Wisconsin city on the Mississippi River], Crele was one of the most active participants in the games of base ball, town ball foot races, horse races, &c., and yet at that time, by the claim made for him, he must have been ninety-three years old. Beouchard says men don't usually run foot races at that age. He says Crele was then 45 or 50 years old. In 1832 Crele was a scout and express carrier during the Black Hawk war, and underwent much active labor, although according to the claim made for him he must have been at the time 106 years old. Beouchard remarks again "that men don't usually act as scouts or express carriers when they are 106 years old, and that too in Indian wars." ....He concludes: "Crele may be 96 years old, but I don't believe he is a day older." We have no doubt Beourchard is entirely correct in the matter."[1]
Footnotes
- ↑ . Milwaukee Sentinel, 1865-04-04.
