American Sports

American Sports offers a reflective, analytical history of American sports from the colonial era to the present. Readers will focus on the diverse relationships between sports and class, gender, race, ethnicity, religion and region, and understand how these interactions can bind diverse groups together. By considering the economic, social and cultural factors that have surrounded competitive sports, readers will understand how sports have reinforced or challenged the values and behaviors of society.

A comprehensive revision to the 7th edition preserves the detailed coverage of sports history while incorporating recent scholarship and expanded treatment of the challenges and dilemmas of twenty-first century sports. Greater attention is given to the sporting activities of women, African Americans, Latinos and Native Americans.

Pamela Grundy is an independent historian who lives in Charlotte, North Carolina, where she pursues a variety of writing, teaching and museum projects. Her sports-related publications include Learning to Win: Sports, Education and Social Change in Twentieth-Century North Carolina, and Shattering the Glass: The Remarkable History of Women's Basketball (co-written with Susan Shackelford). Her work on sports has been published in the Journal of American History, the International Journal of the History of Sport and Southern Cultures, and has received awards from the American Historical Association, the North American Society for Sport History the History of Education Society and the Oral History Association.

In This Section:

    I)  Brief Table of Contents

    II) Detailed Table of Contents

I) Brief Table of Contents

Chapter 1. Sports in Early America

Chapter 2. The Setting for Nineteenth-Century Sports

Chapter 3. The Sporting Fraternity and Its Spectacles

Chapter 4. The Rise of America’s National Game

Chapter 5. Elite Sports

Chapter 6. The Rise of Intercollegiate Sports

Chapter 7. Broader Horizons

Chapter 8. Sports, Culture and Nation: 1900-1945

Chapter 9. The Rise of Organized Youth Sports

Chapter 10. The Age of Sports Heroes

Chapter 11. Baseball’s Golden Age

Chapter 12. The Intercollegiate Football Spectacle

Chapter 13. The Rise and Decline of Organized Women’s Sports

Chapter 14. Globalizing Sports, Redefining Race

Chapter 15. The Setting of Organized Sports Since World War II

Chapter 16. Professional Team Sports in the Age of Television

Chapter 17. College Sports in the Age of Television

Chapter 18. Racial Revolution

Chapter 19. Women's Liberation

Chapter 20. All Sports All the Time

Chapter 21. Sports in the Twenty-First Century

II) Detailed Table of Contents

Chapter 1. Sports in Early America

The North American Ball Game

The Mesoamerican Ball Game

European Sporting Traditions

European Sport in the Americas

Sport in the Southern British Colonies

Southern Festivals

Tensions in New England

"Lawful Sport” in New England and the Middle Colonies

The Great Awakening and Republican Ideology

Chapter 2. The Setting for Nineteenth-Century Sports

Conquering Space and Time

The Rise of Middle-Class Victorian Culture

“Rational” Recreation

Alternatives and Opposition

The Sporting Fraternity

The Base Ball Fraternity

The Elite Clubs

Sports Moves to the Center

Sports and Respect

Chapter 3. The Sporting Fraternity and Its Spectacles

Enclaves of the Fancy

John Cox Stevens: Wealthy Sporting Patron

Pedestrianism

The Early History of American Prizefighting

Meanings of Prizefighting

Prizefighting in the Postbellum Era

Enter John L. Sullivan

Chapter 4. The Rise of America’s National Game

The Club-Based Fraternal Game

Baseball as a Commercial Enterprise

The National League

The Players’ Revolt

Between the Foul Lines and in the Stands

Baseball Overseas

Chapter 5. Elite Sports

Sports and the Forging of an American Upper Class

The Wealthy New York Sporting Community

Thoroughbred Horse Racing

Athletic Clubs

Amateurism and Its Uses

Cricket Clubs and Country Clubs

Chapter 6. The Rise of Intercollegiate Sports

Rowing: The First Intercollegiate Sport

Origins of Football

Walter Camp: Father of American Football

Football and the Strenuous Life

Football and the Making of College Communities

Football as a Sporting Spectacle

Chapter 7. Broader Horizons

The Carlisle Indians

Doors Close on African American Athletes

Women Join the Game

Fending Off Critics

Chapter 8. Sports, Culture and Nation: 1900-1945

Sports in Daily Life

The Media and Sports

Consumer Culture and a New Middle Class

Flappers and Female Athletes

Race and International Competition

Challenges

The Challenge of Amateurism

Chapter 9. The Rise of Organized Youth Sports

Luter Halsey Gulick Jr.

The Evolutionary Theory of Play

The Public Schools Athletic League

The Playground Movement

Public High School Sports

Chapter 10. The Age of Sports Heroes

Jack Johnson: Smashing Race Stereotypes

Babe Ruth: Extraordinary Success

Jack Dempsey and Tex Rickard: Charisma and Ballyhoo

Helen Wills: “The American Girl”

Chapter 11. Baseball’s Golden Age

Baseball’s Coming of Age

An Age of the Pitcher

Ty Cobb

The Quest for Order

The Black Sox Scandal and the Reign of Kenesaw Mountain Landis

An Age of Team Dynasties

The Negro Leagues

U.S.-Caribbean Connections

End of an Era

Chapter 12. The Intercollegiate Football Spectacle

The Age of Crisis

The Formation of Conferences

“King Football”

The Football Coach as Hero

Incomplete Democratization

Continuing Controversies

Chapter 13. The Rise and Decline of Organized Women’s Sports

Babe Didrikson: Triumph and Struggle

Hazel Walker: Creating Professional Opportunities

Historically Black Colleges Nurture Female Athletes

All-American Girls

A War over Turf and Principles

Rah, Rah, Rah

Chapter 14. Globalizing Sports, Redefining Race

The Olympic Games

Jim Thorpe: American Olympic Legend

The Olympics as Civic Showcase

The Nazi Olympics

The Brown Bomber

Significance of Racial Accomplishment

Chapter 15. The Setting of Organized Sports Since World War II

Affluence and Suburbanization

Television

Television Transforms Sports

Roone Arledge, ABC and the Rise of Televised Sport

Sports and Social Change

A New Generation

Political Retrenchment

Cable and the Internet

Chapter 16. Professional Team Sports in the Age of Television

Early Days

Pro Football’s Golden Age

Marketing Professional Team Sports

The Woes of Baseball

On the Diamond

Professional Basketball on the Rise

Players Get Involved

Chapter 17. College Sports in the Age of Television

The Economics of College Athletics

Evolution of a Cartel

College Football Goes Big-Time

Recruiting Big-Time Teams

College Basketball Enters the National Spotlight

Chapter 18. Racial Revolution

Jackie Robinson and the Politics of Restraint

Widening Opportunities

Muhammad Ali

The Olympic Project for Human Rights

Latino Athletes Step Up

Native Americans Protest “Indian” Mascots

Activism for Athletes: The End of the Reserve Clause

Chapter 19. Women's Liberation

Small Steps

Women’s Liberation and Title IX

Losing the Fight for Independence

Billie Jean King and the Women’s Tennis Association

Public Image

Conservative Retrenchment

Chapter 20. All Sports All the Time

Cable Television

NASCAR

Baseball Reaches Out to Latinos

Nike and the NBA

Selling Women’s Sports

Chapter 21. Sports in the Twenty-First Century

Youth Sports

The College “Arms Race”

Professionals and Performance-Enhancing Drugs

The NFL and CTE

Away from the Field

Who Should Be a Mascot?

Who Is an American?

Who Is a Woman?

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