The Salt Lake herald. [volume] (Salt Lake City [Utah]) 1870-1909, 1902-08-03
BASEBALL SLANG.
Origin of the Peculiar Terms Used
by Fans
New York Times

A~NCW L
A correspondent telegraphed the
news of an important baseball game
played in a western city to a New York
paper. Here is the story of one inning
taken from his account, which ap-
peared next morning in print:
In the eighth, with one out, Jones
dropped McBride's fly, and then Cor
coran tripled. McJames walked Smith
and Dahlen threw low on Beckley's
bounder, scoring Corcoran. Smith then
stole third and scored while Beckley
was being put OUT
These three sentences would have
made Lindley Murray cover his face
and Noah Webster gasp; but neither
the grammarian nor the lexicogra pher
knew and loved the game of baseball.
To one familiar with the national sport
of the United States they unroll a pan
Drama of that eighth inning, vivid and
satisfying to the last detail. Although
they may defy the rules of grammar,
although they seem to be carelessly
thrown together, every word was cho-
sen with pains and with a fixed object
in view. Fifteen minutes of intense
activity-and epitomized in twice as
many words To secure such con-
densation without a sacrifice of clear
ness the writer had to call to his aid
that tersest and subtlest medium of ex-
pressi0n-slang. Not the ordinary, IA
miliar slang of the streets, but the
peculiar language of the baseball field |;
and he has made it serve him well.
Every line Of activity has its own
| mode of expression. Every kind of
work. study: or play gathers its own
particular Voca bulary. The terms OF
science are Latin and Greek COM
pounds, called technical The language
of everyday life, of our common tasks
and pleasures, is English; and when
a new expression is born out of its
restless activity il takes a place in the
wide vocabulary of slang. The words
matician and the logician are invented
! deliberately to meet the exigencies OF
/ new discoveries; and they are rooted
/ deep in classical etymology- When
/ mankind plays he forgets his learning
! and remembers oniy his race. His ey-
| pressions are short, sharp and vivid
| Old games have a rich Saxon vocabu-
| larry which was ripe generations age
/ and seldom changes When new sports
classical dictionaries to pick out new
Technology for them. We play the
/ game: and when terms are needed Il
describe it's novel situations, they arr
not wanting. A word here and a wore
! there-and in an Incredibly short tins
| the new sport is fully clothed with ;
crisp, vigorous language of it's own
In no tongue does slang enjoy ;
wider use than in the English Spoken
on this side of the Atlantic. In its eff
fort TO keep pace with the swift devel
/ opment of the race il serves. our Ian
guage throws out running tendrils o
popular speech, which sometimes Inv
to become stout branches of the paren
stern. but more often wither and drol
off as the fad which gave them brit
is forgotten. Baseball is purely al
American sport, and it is not surpris
ing that its vocabulary is UNUSUAL.
rich in the racy idioms of the language
In the atmosphere of the nationa
game the rank plant of language b:s<
into a hundred strange forms-word
which catch the significance of a sen
tence. expressions unintelligible to tn
lavnan until explained in the light o
their picturesque origin. Every variet
of emotion enters into their compost
ton: and TO comprehend their full sig
nificance one must be STEPPED in tn
spirit of the "bleachers,' as we'll as tn
knowledge of the diamond.
The lover of baseball, the genuin
| enthusiast, is described by a wor
which is one of the most typical OF hi
own terse vocabulary. He is fan
Fan is merely a contraction 70
| fanatic" a term which applies truI
| to the man. woman or child who
wrapped up in the fascinations of III
/ game. The fans" are the faithfI
] sportsmen who know no greater 10
than may be gained by spending a
August afternoon drinking dee
draughts of delirium at the baseba
! grounds. To see him standing, COATES
and hatless, and waving both garment
, aloft while the air pulsates with hi
paean of victory or defiance. is to re
! alize that he is fan" in more way
: than one. The name was unknown
few wears ago but it has taken q fir1
hold. and if it stays until better SUI
plants il. its life will be long.
sBleachers'' is a much older wOr
) What better description of the ban
hoard seats where the fans sit du
ing the long, glazing afternoons
blissful frenzy? The effect, perhaps,
ANYTHING but bleaching, and .'the tai
, nery'' would be nearer the strict trut
: for the city man who stays at hon
and spends his summer afternoons
the hall grounds meets his friends r
tI1rninC from mountain and shore wit
a face as brown as theirs. But ''bleacl
J ers'' they have been. and .-bleacher:
! they viii be in all probability as lor
as the game is played
The fans vocabulary is not a sti