Vintage Base Ball is alive and well in the Texas Forts Trail Region!
(adapted from the Vintage Base Ball Association website)
Vintage Base Ball is base ball (yes, it was two words originally) played by the rules and customs of any earlier period. Vintage base ballists can be frequently seen playing their sport at open-air museums, re-enactments and city parks and diamonds. Some groups consider vintage base ball to be a new sport, but at its core, vintage base ball is a reflection of how baseball existed at an earlier time.
Most vintage base ball clubs play the game of base ball as it was played in the late 1850s, 1860s and 1880s, adopting the rules recorded in the Beadle's Dime Base Ball Player, first published in 1860, which recounted the third meeting of the National Association of Base Ball Players.
The mid-nineteenth century game was considerably different than modern baseball. Most ballists played with bare hands until the mid-1880s, but starting in the the late 1860s a few catchers with raw hands needed to wear thin buckskin gloves to keep on playing. Until 1865, fair or foul balls caught on one bound were outs, but the best players always attempted to catch it "on the fly" which eventually made the rule unnecessary. There are numerous difference in the all-amateur games of baseball prior to 1869, but modern spectators would still recognize the game as base ball.
Vintage Base Ball games can be seen at Fort McKavett, Fort Concho and the Buffalo Gap Historic Village.