Most sports fans are familiar with the Little League World Series, held each year in South Williamsport, Pennsylvania. It has become a major sporting event, with worldwide media coverage, a certain level of celebrity status for the top players, and even bookmakers setting betting lines. But how did Little League develop to this point (and why South Williamsport, Pennsylvania, of all places)?
Though there were baseball leagues that could loosely be considered forerunners of Little League (e.g., American Legion baseball for teenage boys), the history of Little League proper commenced in 1938.
The ironically childless Carl Stotz of Williamsport, Pennsylvania, liked to toss the ball around with his nephews Jimmy and Major. In 1938 he helped them find a suitable vacant lot, obtain enough equipment, and experiment with different “kid-size” field dimensions for some informal, pick-up baseball games for them and some friends. That summer, he came up with the idea of doing something a little more formal for the area kids who might want to play baseball in a more organized way.
By the following year, 1939, Stotz, now aided by his wife Grayce, and his friends George and Bert Bebble, and their wives Annabelle and Eloise, launched what he soon decided to call “Little League.” During that first year, John and Peggy Lindemuth were added, making eight volunteer adults as the Board of Directors, with Stotz in the Commissioner-type role. There were enough interested boys to form three teams, and local businesses Lycoming Dairy, Lundy Lumber, and Jumbo Pretzel were prevailed upon to put up sponsorship fees of $30 each (not an insignificant sum in those days) for uniforms and equipment.
From the beginning, Little League stressed values of sportsmanship, fair play, and teamwork. Stotz intended it as a wholesome alternative to youth idleness and the tendency to find trouble.
The first ever Little League game was on June 6, 1939. The team sponsored by Lundy Lumber defeated the team sponsored by Lycoming Dairy 23-8.
Evidently no “slaughter rule” was in place yet to shield children from humiliation-size defeats. Nor did the Lycoming Dairy team seem to suffer from that lack, as they were in fact the team that went on to win the first year’s championship over their two rivals following a round robin schedule and playoff series.
From there, Little League baseball expanded like mad. The very next season there was already another whole league nearby. By 1946, there were twelve. In 1947, Little League expanded beyond Pennsylvania for the first time, adding a team in Hammonton, New Jersey.
That same year, 1947, saw the first Little League World Series, as the various leagues decided to crown an overall champion. The championship was held at Williamsport, (moved to South Williamsport in 1959). A team from the Williamsport league defeated a team from the Lock Haven, Pennsylvania league to become the first ever Little League World Series champions.
The exponential growth of Little League only increased from there. Little League surpassed one hundred leagues by 1949, and one thousand by 1952.
Nor is media coverage, even television coverage, anything new. In 1953, the Little League World Series was televised for the first time, by CBS. (Radio coverage was on ABC, handled by a young unknown reporter named Howard Cosell.) Starting in 1963, it became a mainstay on ABC’s “Wide World of Sports.” In 1985, ABC carried the championship game live for the first time.
1951 saw the establishment of the first league outside the United States, in British Columbia, Canada. Just six years later, a team from outside the U.S. won the Little League World Series for the first time, with a team from Monterrey, Mexico prevailing in 1957. Ultimately, Little League has expanded to over 100 countries, representing every continent but Antarctica. Little League is truly an international sport, with teams from outside the U.S. routinely winning the World Series. In fact, teams from Taiwan won a stunning 31 consecutive World Series games during a stretch in the early 1980s.
The aluminum bat was added in 1972, and girls were added in 1974, both to howls of protest from traditionalists. Neither destroyed Little League (nor civilization).
Probably the biggest Little League scandal occurred in 2001, when a team from the Bronx, led by superstar Danny Almonte pitching the first perfect game in the World Series since 1957, took the crown, only to retroactively be forced to forfeit their games when it was discovered that Almonte was a good two years older than the age limit.
But through it all, Little League just seems to get bigger and bigger. Today, in addition to the original Little League for ages 8-12, there are seven other affiliated programs with their own championship tournaments. These include Junior League for ages 13-14, Senior League for ages 14-16, and Big League for ages 16-18, plus softball versions of all four of these levels.
All from a guy in Pennsylvania who liked to play ball with his nephews.
