Los Angeles herald., 1906-07-04
YANKEE SAILORS
DIAMOND ARTISTS
BASEBALL HAS GIRDLED THE
WORLD
Japs Take to Game Like Ducks to
Water and Are Wild over Sport.
Australians Revel In Amerl-
can National Pastime

With the return of the Angel baseball
team Los Angeles will doubtless ex'
perience a revival Of the diamond in'
terest which at one time made Southern
California one of the best ball centerS
Of the country A dearth of the pro.
fessional game has aroused diamond
thirst that must needs be whetted by
another period of the national pastime
That baseball is cosmopolitan in Its
extent is supremely evident upon per
usal of the following story told by one
of Uncle Sans petty naval officers:
Baseball has girded the world, and
the bluejackets of the navy have done
most of the grdling. Not only have
American naval sailors played the
game among themselves on the beaches
of practically every civilized country
or, the globe. but they've started the
baseball bug a-going in a whole lot OF
places
Take Honolulu, in the Hawaiian ISL
ands, for instance. The Americans
down there-that is the island born
sons of native American parents-never
took much of shine to baseball till
the bluejackets Of the navy got them
worked up over IL.
when Al Spalding's -circling
bunch of ball players made their tour a
good many years ago a number OF
games were played in Honolulu. but the
folks down there took only polite in
terest in the contests and attended the
games more for the sake of being civil
to a gang of visiting Americans than
because they had any real interest in
the sport.
But when the men from the MEMO
war in the port of Honolulu began to
play games of ball among themselves
in the environs of Honolulu the young
fellows born down there, away off the
baseball beat and ut of the baseball
atmosphere. began to sit up and take
notice.
The instinct of the game was in them.
all right, but they'd never allowed it to
develop. The bluejackets got them all
worked up over the game, however, and
they began to form scrub mines and
practice playing ball After few years
they fell into the way of playing with
the mem wars men, and it soon fell
out that they won as many games as
they lost.
Hawaiians Play
"At the present time baseball is a
raging and rampant bug down in the
Hawaiian islands. There's a regular
professional interisland league down
mot a shade under the best brand of
ball dished out by the minor leagues
of the mainland as the Hawaiian
folks call the United States.
There are clever mines representing
Honolulu, Lahaina, Hilo, Hanelei, Ka
halui and other important island towns,
and they draw big crowds of keen
rcoters, who know every inside kink of
the game and who keep as close cases
on the players as the fans at any ball
park in this country. Young Mr.. Car
ter, the governor of Hawaii, is a base
ball bug, and so are most of the lead
ing Hawaiian officials. Quite number
OF professional players from the minor
leagues of this country have gone down
to Hawaii to join the professional mines
of the islands. and they've all done well.
Some prominent minor league players
have during the past few years gone to
Honolulu to winter and pick up some
spare change by playing ball and keep
ing in first rate condition, amid the
most beautiful surroundings in the
whole world bar none, at the same
time
The ladies attend the games in
Hawaii and they're enthusiastic root
ers just as are the fan girls in the
states.
American bluejackets introduced the
baseball bug into Japan, too. Baseball
in Japan! Well, l should say yes!
Baseball till you can't rest in Japan!
Some of the corkingest games of ball
! ever looked at, especially from the
fielding point of view, I've seen in the
coast cities of Japan, played by the
little brown men who administered the
beautiful walloplng to the army of the
czar.
Learned From Sailors
"Shore parties of ball playing sailor
men from our ships interested the agile
and initiative little Japs in the game
as long is ten years ago, and returning
JEp students from the United States
helped to plug the game of ball along
in the dominions of the mikado. They've
got several ripping professional leagues
a-going in Japan at the present time,
and the Japs have taken to the game
like ducks to water
They're natural ball players, being
quick as cats on their feet and clever
at getting at the meat and meaning Of
the inside stuff, and they're wild over
the game. You wouldn't want to see
a better game of ball anywhere than
one, for instance, between the Kobe
and Nagasaki teams, or a game be-
tween the clubs representing HakOdate
and Yokohama. The Japs are wonder
full fielders, and I've seen some Unfolding
by Jap players that would make the
most seasoned fan in this country blink.
"a picked nine from Japan visited
San Francisco and some Of the other
Pacific coast cities last year. playing
with some of the best of the slope
clubs. and they went away with more
games than they'd lost. The little chaps
have got swell whips being naturally
muscular and trained in athletic work
from their infancy. They are extreme
ly sensitive over misplays that they
make.
THE umpire's decision is never ques-
toned by so much as a shrug by the
Jap players, who, on the whole, are in
every department of life about the best
disciplined people in the world. Most
of the umpires are Japanese students
who have spent years in the United
States, and the Jap players take it 70,
granted that these umpires, after their
long residence in the home of baseball
simply can't go wrong, and abide by
their decisions no matter how rank
some of them may appear 10 the un-
prejudiced observer from the outside
Australians Are Fans
1T doesn't sem to be generally known
that baseball is a good deal of a bug
In Australia, too, but that's "A fact, all
the same, and American men-o'- wars
men did good deal toward STARTING