Baseball History ALIVE AND WELL IN THIRD CENTURY
Notre Dame baseball has produced its share of innovators and memories. The Notre Dame baseball program punctuated its growing emergence as modern-day contender by advancing to the 2002 College World Series, part of a 16-year run of seasons with 40-plus victories (the third-longest streak in all of Division I baseball, as of 2004). But the program’s legacy runs much deeper, stretching back through 119 seasons and even as far back as the 1860s, when baseball began to emerge as a popular diversion at the Northern Indiana school. Notre Dame can trace its founding to the mid-19th century, when Father Edward Sorin, C.S.C., and a small band of French missionaries set up camp a little north of South Bend, Indiana. The 1842 construction included building a log church and a small building and the founders immodestly labeled their creation the University of Notre Dame du Lac (Our Lady of the Lake). In the early years, this all-male university enrolled students from first grade through college and there was a heavy emphasis placed on recreational activities. For the next 24 years after its founding, the main athletic diversions of Notre Dame students were ice skating, swimming and
First baseman Angus McDonald (left) and second baseman Frank McNicholas (right) were two of Notre Dame’s first varsity baseball letterwinners, in the late 1800s.
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Adrian “Cap” Anson – who helped popularize baseball at Notre Dame – was considered one of the most dynamic players in professional baseball during the late 1800s.
cycling. Students also could be found playing team sports of European origin: cricket and soccer. That all changed in 1866, when two young men from Marshalltown, Iowa – Sturgis and Adrian Anson – introduced a new sport to Notre Dame. The sport was base ball (it didn’t become one word until much later) and it quickly became the biggest thing to hit the campus.
On any spring day, most of the Notre Dame student body could be found playing base ball on the many ball diamonds on the campus. During this period, Notre Dame had approximately 500 students in all combined programs. In his autobiography, A Ballplayer’s Career, Adrian “Cap” Anson spoke fondly of his days at Notre Dame. After leaving Notre Dame, in 1871, Anson became one of the original major league baseball players in the National Association, the first major league. Anson went on to become the most dominant figure of 19th-century baseball, as the playing manager of the National League Chicago White Stockings (now the Cubs). Anson retired after a 27-year career with a .329 batting average and he was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1939, as a member of the fourth class. For the first 20 years of base ball at Notre Dame, all games were played on campus between club teams. The school began playing off-campus foes in the spring of 1888. Notre Dame decided to sponsor varsity baseball in 1892. Five years earlier, the University had launched a varsity football program when Michigan’s squad came to South Bend to teach a group of students the fundamentals. The next day, they played a football game and Michigan won handily.
Notre Dame’s third varsity baseball team (1895; 3-2 record)
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