Baseball's Union Association: The Short, Strange Life of a 19th-Century Major League

by Justin Mckinney

Overview

Hastily formed in 1883 as a rival, third major league, the Union Association upset the moguls of the baseball world and disrupted the status quo. Backed by Henry V. Lucas, an impetuous 26-year-old millionaire from St. Louis, the UA existed for one chaotic season in 1884. This first full-length history of the Union Association tells the captivating story of the league's brief and enigmatic existence. Lucas recruited a wild mix of disgruntled stars, misfits, crooks, has-beens, drunks, and the occasional spectator--along with a future star or two. The result was a bizarre experiment that sowed both turmoil and hope before fading into oblivion.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9781476647364
Publisher:	McFarland & Company, Incorporated Publishers
Publication date:	11/16/2022
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	277
File size:	11 MB
Note:	This product may take a few minutes to download.
Age Range:	18 Years

About the Author

Justin Mckinney is a baseball researcher and archivist living in Canada. He has written articles on 19th century and early 20th century baseball for the SABR Research Journal Base Ball: Journal of the Early Game, and the SABR Biography Project, and writes about deceased baseball players at medium.com/@BaseballObscura
Justin Mckinney is a baseball researcher and archivist living in Calgary, Alberta, Canada. He has written articles on 19th century and early 20th century baseball for the SABR Research Journal Base Ball: Journal of the Early Game, and the SABR Biography Project and writes about deceased baseball players at https://medium.com/@BaseballObscura

Table of Contents

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments
Preface
 1. Al Pratt’s Association
 2. The Very Best of Ball Players
 3. Enter Henry V. Lucas
 4. The War Begins
 5. The Union Association Takes the Stage
 6. “The Finest! The Nearest! The Prettiest!”
 7. One Month in Altoona, Pennsylvania
 8. Going to Kansas City
 9. Independence Day in Washington
10. Baltimore’s Battle
11. “Bollicky” Bill and the “Wizard”
12. The Hoss and the Playboy
13. The Bell Tolls for the Keystones
14. A Matter of Dollars and Cents
15. The Windy City Blows Out of Town
16. A Curse Falls Upon Delaware
17. The Union Goes North … Western
18. Cream City Chronicles
19. The Vagabonds from Minnesota
20. The Wild West and the Race for Third Place
21. The Associations Face Off
22. The Real Games Begin
23. Almost Equivalent to Actual Dishonesty
24. The Double Cross
25. What Killed the Union Association?
26. The Ghosts of the Union
27. Henry Lucas Opts Out
Epilogue
Notes
Bibliography
Index

Editorial Reviews

A remarkable compilation of research on the quirky, ill-fated league that is focused on contemporary primary sources to under-gird an analysis of how the Union Association formed, competed, and disbanded during its sole year of existence in 1884”—Charlie Bevis, author, Tim Keefe: A Biography of the Hall of Fame Pitcher and Player-Rights Advocate

From the Publisher