Baseball Hall of Fame- A Living History of America’s Greatest Game

Sport and Cinema's Guide to Books

Since opening its doors in 1939, Baseball’s Hall of Fame has entertained 14 million visitors. The shrine in Cooperstown comes alive on the pages of this coffee table book that examines, through brilliant photography and compelling prose, the American phenomenon that is baseball.

Celebrating the 70^th anniversary of the beloved baseball mecca in upstate New York, prolific author Bert Sugar provides us with a unique walking tour through its grand and glorious halls, one page at a time.

Sugar, the author of over 50 sports books, walks us through decade by decade, exhibit by exhibit covering a lot of ground including:

-The game’s efforts to break the color barrier.

-The emergence of night baseball.

-The accomplishments of women’s baseball.

-Legendary broadcasters, writers and dream teams.

-The evolution of equipment from balls, bats and gloves to uniforms and cleats.

This book is a colorful chronicle of the game of baseball.

The SandC Interview: Bert Sugar author – “Baseball Hall of Fame- A Living History of America’s Greatest Game”

What is the essence of this book?

 I fell in love with it all.

It is the history of the sport as shownon the walls of the Hall of Fame and I think Cooperstown has some of the most fascinating exhibits and woven within that history of  baseball up to today they tell a story of not only a great sport but America as well.

To look at a Honus Wagner locker or a Babe Ruth bat and a Joe DiMaggio glove- it puts you there.

Granted, time, like taffy, stretches out but baseball has a continuum that no other sport has and I think the Hall of Fame epitomizes this.

Talk about baseball’s ties with American culture in general

They grew up together. They have a history. Poets and other writers like Walt Whitman pay homage to the game. Mark Twain talks about baseball, not basketball and sure as hell not mixed martial arts. Baseball really is America.

How did the folks at Cooperstown participate?

They were very cooperative. They let us in many cases take exhibits out of their cases for photography.

The curators wanted to show all the way from the beginning of the beginning.

And how good a spot is Cooperstown to have the hall?

It is wonderful. My directions to get there are,  ’go up the New York State throughway and turn left 100 years’. It is like Brigadoon, a bucolic little place.

Is baseball’s Cooperstown the greatest hall of fame in all of sports?

I think it is the granddaddy. In many ways because of the town it is located in. It has that rustic feel and baseball to me is rustic. Do you remember the first baseball game you went to? It is in the city. You walked in and it is a time warp. The hustle and bustle of inner city life is exchanged for a park filled with grass. Cooperstown is like that.

Not only was Cooperstown the first hall of fame, opening in 1939, it has kept the flame, that continuous line going.

They just closed down the sports museum in New York City. People don’t go to the big city for that. They go to Springfield (basketball), Canton (football) and Cooperstown. The small town gives that feel is part and parcel of the extension of the hall of fame.

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