The Miller press. [volume] (Miller, S.D.) 190?-current, 1922-08-03

when the downpOur of bursting shell
became too distracting.
Some historians assert that the
Greek games formed the foundation
for the lucid thinking and the lofty
art concepts that made her product
classic. Yet the Olympian and the
Pythian games at their best afforded
no such spontaneous, and at the same
time intricate, interplay of muscle and
mind as baseball.
Throwing, catching, and running are
as old as man; but it took the Ameri-
can genius for play. no less distinc-
tive than the American genius for
science, industry, and commerce, to
wald these motifs into a game that
puts a premium on skill, yet admits
Of infinite variety; that rawest youth
or trained athlete may play and that
Presidents and Office boys steal away
to watch.
If the Greeks paved the way for
classic art by teaching adults TO play
and Great Britain followed in her
footsteps with a more spontaneous
and democratic ~fervor, America now
appears as the most fOrward-looking
nation in her. attention to children's
Fairgrounds. There Is nothing arti-
fetal about the games taught to chill
dren on American Fairgrounds. They
are products of a rich heritage Of
play tradition. Neither written history
nor the faint traces Of prehistoric
times carry us back to a period when
children did not play.
Excavators in Central America
found tiny rattles of bone and clay.
as old as the pyramids of Egypt, in
graves alongside baby skeletons. In
Attica's tOmbs were uncovered dolls
of pre-classic days. made of ivory and
terra Gotta. Little Hippodamia had a
miniature bed, with Stats, for his
dolls, for boys formerly played with
dolls. Roman children's toys were
held in such high esteem by their
elders that when the children grew
too old for them they were offered to
patron gods.
SdUVSS WIN u'S od's
Running, throwing, hitting, and
kicking are the fundamental muscular
operations of Americas characteristic
sports-baseball, football, tennis, and
golf. The peoples of antiquity mani
tested all these instincts in cruder
form.
Luzon hillmen. the Polynesians, and
the Eskimo and Sumatra islanders had
games played by kicking a bail.
Greeks played 1t, and the Roman
game. harpastum, derived it's name
from the Greek ~ seize" which is
evidence that carving the ball was
pIacticed then. With shoes of hide,
the medieval Italians played a game
which seems the direct ancestor Of the
Anglo-Saxon college sport. Gaelic
scholars point to a football game In
Ireland before the time OF Christ, and
until comparatively recent times
Shrove Tuesday was distinctively an
occasion for football as Is our Thanks
giving today.
In old England football was even
rougher Than most sports OF those
hardy times. James I thought II was
''meeter for lameing than making able
the users thereof" Henry VIII and
Elizabeth ruled against 1t. Edward III
frowned pon II for its interference
with archery and also because of the
commotion 1t aroused.
likewise. n must go back to the
Greeks and Romans for the origin
OF tennis. which descended to Eng
land By way 10 France. IN the Twelfth
century a game with ball and plated
g"t bat was played on horseback.
Then came "La boude," In which the
horses were abandoned. Henry VIII
of England was a youthful devotee.
while Louis XIv's heavy expense ac-
counts show salaries paid to care
takers of his courts.
II tennis has a royal lineage. golf.
which was later regarded as a rich
mans game, had most plebeian be-
belief. II seems lot to have originated
In Scotland, but I'm northern Europe.
Apparently II was first played on ice,
being one of the winter sports adapted
70 the nhysical geography Of the Low
Countries.
Bv the Fifteenth century golf had
ATTAINED such vogue In Scotland that
II threatened the cherished archery.
and II Is classed with 'fute-ball" and
other "unprofsabh spartis" by James
Nv. That monarch. however. seems to
have d~isregarded his own edict. as
did enough other Scotck-ncn TO keep
the game alive.