Friday, April 8, 2005 3:30-5:00 p.m.

Bernard Weisberger:

“Baseball, Bylines, and the Vernacular: The Emergence of Baseball Journalism and Its Impact on the American Language”

Author of The Great Chicago Streetcar Series of 1906 (forthcoming)

Baseball reporting in 1906 was part of a new, urban journalism that was reporting the ordinary life of great cities in the unvarnished, inventive and earthy terms of streets, shops, offices and places of public amusement. It thus stepped into a stream of evolving American language and literature that shook off academic and Victorian restraints in favor of picturing real experience in the most direct possible voice, which was also the voice of jazz and ragtime. The paper examines the particular conditions of daily baseball writing as they affected the profession’s contribution to the modernization of American culture.

THE NEWBERRY LIBRARY. 60 W. WALTON, CHICAGO, IL
THERE IS NO ADMISSION CHARGE. Discounted parking is available at garages located at 100 W. Chestnut, 100 E. Walton, and 1025 N. Clark. With ticket validation at the Newberry Library's front desk, the rate is $6 for up to 6 hours.