This is a post by Gayle Osterberg, the Library’s Director of Communications.
Herblock political cartoon referencing “Casey at the Bat”
There is joy in Mudville today, as we mark the 125th anniversary since “Casey at the Bat” was first published on June 3, 1888, in the San Francisco Examiner.
The poem, dubbed the “single most famous baseball poem ever written” by the Baseball Almanac, has inspired everything from political cartoons to entire operas.
Written by Ernest L. Thayer – pen name Phin – “Casey at the Bat” has also been recorded multiple times, including this classic 1909 recording by De Wolf Hopper in the Library’s National Jukebox.
In honor of this momentous occasion we’re offering a doubleheader: we invited our friends Dave Jageler and Charlie Slowes, radio announcers for Major League Baseball’s Washington Nationals, each to record his own interpretation of this poetry classic. Here’s Dave, and here’s Charlie.
We love the result, which will be archived in the Library’s Recorded Sound section, to be enjoyed by generations of baseball fans to come.