The Winchester news. [volume] (Winchester, Ky.) 1908-19??, 1908-10-19
GAME IS TAKING
ACROSS BORDER
BASEBALL OUTDISTANClNG ALL
OTHER SPORTS IN POPULAR
iTY AMONG CANADIANS.
TEAMS In NEARLY EVERY TOWN
Seeker and Lacrosse Being Forced
Into Background Hundreds of
Leagues Formed in Dominion by
- Players of States Pastme-Young-
sters Take Up Yankee Game.

Baseball is king in Canada, as it is
in the United States. A resume of the
past summers sports shows that the
American game has shown a greater
increase in popularity there than any
other of the many athletic pastimes
which have secured a hold on the
Canadian people, and from now out
1t is only matter of time when Uncle
Sans most popular outdoor exercise
will become the game of games here
even as 1t is south of the line.
True, lacrosse, which some years
ago was made the national summer
sport Of Canadians, is growing in
popularity all the time, but it is not
anything like so common throughout
the country as baseball. Indeed, la
crosse is sectional, and is feeling the
inroads OF the United States sport
right in Montreal and Ottawa, the
original gardens of the other game.
In fact, there hardly is to be found in
Canada town where baseball is not
played to some extent at least, even In
the wilds of the north
OF course there is little of the pro-
fessional kind, for the country is as
yet too small and poor to make profess
sional sport paying venture to any
extent, but with the increase in popu-
lation and with the increased develop
ment every year, the time is not far
distant when the professional variety
wi in
on the other side of the great lakes
as well, if not better, than to the
south of them, where the teams in
small towns have to buck up against
a certain opposition from the clubs in
large nearby cities, which often hap
pen to be near.
The small city situated close to a
large one where there is a big league
or big minor league ball played is at
serious disadvantage as a ball town,
for the fans get used to better quail
ty OF the game than they are given by
the team in their home lot. AS Canada
develops there will be none of this, at
least for some time, and ere long there
will be any number of professional
leagues springing up in different parts
of the more prosperous provinces.
Right now there are hundreds of
amateur baseball leagues in the coun-
try. The favorite form is that ,of a
league the towns in which are general
ly commercial, county and athletic
rivals. The players usually are anna
teurs until they succeed in getting
pot of money together, when nothing
is thought of dividing the proceeds. In
reality few of the home-brew baseball
players are amateurs, as they usually
manage to make a few dollars out of
the game every summer, for the con-
tests between rival towns always re-
ceive good support from the citizens
of the two places interested.
Besides the teams in the leagues
there are numerous independent aggre-
cations representing towns where the
baseball bug has taken a firm hold
And many of these outlaw outfits play
fine baseball.
Often baseball spirited citizens in a
town club together for the season with
the purpose of putting strong nine
in the field and thereby advertising
the municipality whereof they are res
idents. In many cases this has been
found to be exceedingly valuable from
a publicity standpoint.
We see baseball then making in
roads right in lacrosse centers. In
every town where lacrosse is played
l.
times several.
On the other hand, where baseball
has the, call no lacrosse or other sport
can be found during the season in
which the baseball team is playing.
And there are many towns in Ontario
where there is nothing but baseball
played during the warm months.
And, further, where the American
game once gets a start it sticks for
good, as the schoolboys take to 1t
quicker than to anything else.>
For many years association football.
or socker, was supposed to be the
sport of western Ontario, but it, too.
is giving way, as is lacrosse. In former
years, where they had nearly all the
towns west of Toronto in one or other
of the big association football leagues,
now there are few of the larger places
to be found with teams in the socker
organizations. The reason of this Is
found in the increase of baseball as
sport of the people while football has
not kept up with the times.
"BiII" Warner to Coach Indians.