Baseball history buffs should check out the Library of Congress’ archives of Spalding Base Ball Guides. These archives range from 1889 to 1939 and contain a wealth of historical information on National and American League base ball when the game we loved was spelled with two words) as well as some minor league info too.
Be forewarned, the pages of Spalding’s are scanned images and therefore not searchable or indexed. If you want to find something you’ll have look for it, But I guarantee if you’re a fan of old time base ball, the search itself will be worth it. You’ll run across some neat news tidbits and photos along the way.
Thanks to Cluke for passing this along! He wrote:
I was just geeky enough as a 14 year old and then later to spend many hours looking up old microfilm of newspapers and getting into the sports section (and other stuff) for hours at a time.If it’s old baseball stats- I never tire of it. The digital age is great for browsing from home but there’s nothing like the old micro film of the Trib and the times to follow along with past seasons of the Sox.
Funny, I remember using microfilm back in the days before the Internet, too. I was replaying the 1970 National League using the APBA Baseball Game while in college and the University of Illinois library archives allowed me to look up the box scores of that year. Not unlike browsing the Spalding Guides, in the process of searching for the box scores, I ran across some gems of articles.