The Cheyenne daily leader. [volume] (Cheyenne, Wyo.) 1870-1884, 1877-07-29
ADJUSTMENTS 1ne THEIR ABUSE.
The majority of American people do


The majority of American people do
not play enough; it is all business and
work with them, and they take but lit
tie recreation and but few holidays.
An innovation on this old and unsat-
1sfactory system of "all work and no
play has been made, however, by
Young America in late years, by the
introduction of athletic games and
other amusements. Cricket, baseball,
football, rolling ten-pins and similar
games have been introduced and have
become popular in their turn, and u
boys, young and old, have thus learned
to divide their time into hours for labor
and play.
One of the characteristics OF our peo-
pie Is, however, an inclination to go
from n extreme to another. From
''all work and no play" some of our
young men have gone over to ''all play
and no work. and thus the danger has
become imminent, that an in itself in
nocent and healthful amusement is be-
ing made u positive injury to those that
engage in it. There is the game of
baseball, for instance. A year or two
ago a few of our young men introduced
the game in our city; they organized a
ball club, and played occasionally
for exercise and amusement. Gradu-
ally the game became a hobby with
them, they were infatuated with it,
and went to extremes. Not satisfied
with playing social games at home,
they had to initiate the professional
players in the east, and begin to travel
about the country in search of other
diamond fields. The game which at
first was a pastime, soon became Il
dangerous source of all kinds of mis-
chief for these young men. 1t brought
them into contact with many loose
characters, introduced them into
sporting circles, led them into various
temptations to which many have
yielded, and soon their favorite game
became only a device for gambling.
They were moulded into passive tools
for sharpers, who manipulated the boys
and their games as it best suited their
nefarious schemes.
Thus here as elsewhere the once
popular national game has fallen
into disgrace, and in the States
is only being patronized now fly
professionals, who are being hired
by sporting men, rs horses are hired to
enter races, for the gate money and the
money to be won by betting.
The newspapers of the country. which
have contributed so much toward
making baseball playing popular among
the people, have generally condemned
the abuse of it, and latterly have
assigned it to its proper place among
the devices for gambling. A few jour
mails of the far west, have recently made
a weak attempt to resurrect the base
ball game and to re-establish it in the
popular favor; but their labors are
futile, as recent developments here
abouts have proved. 1t is such i'll
advised encouragement given the ball
players by our contemporaries, which
forces upon the former the belief, that
their game is still looked upon with
favor by the better class of people, and
which made one Of the players indite
the remarkable dispatch from Salt
Lake, last Wednesday, in which he
desired the newspapers of Cheyenne to
publish the fact ''for the benefit of the
people of Cheyenne" that one of his
club had sold out to the wrong side.
The sooner the journals of this section
call things by their right names, the
better it will be for all concerned,