Ask an Urban Historian

David A. Canton is a Jacob & Hilda Blaustein Assistant Professor of History at Connecticut College. Canton specializes in 20th-century American social history, the civil rights movement, urban history, and hip-hop music and black culture in post-industrial America.

Q: Why did baseball emerge as the “city game” in the mid- and late-1800s?

During the early 19th century, baseball was played in rural America. Middle- and upper-class white men formed baseball organizations as a vehicle to socialize. Baseball was a country club sport like golf and tennis are now. The players were more concerned with displaying Victorian attitudes, such as control and conduct, than winning.

During the turn of the century, the nation shifted from an agrarian to an industrial society. Baseball was an important component of progressivism and urbanization. As urbanization spread across the nation, it was more difficult to play baseball because buildings and factories took over the vacant lots. As a result, Young Men’s Christian Association (YMCA) and local governments built parks for recreational activity. Progressives viewed baseball as a vehicle to socialize white ethnic and poor boys. The thinking went that if the boys played baseball, they would obtain middle-class values and not become victims of urban vices.

In other ways, baseball benefited from urbanization and industrialization. Railroads allowed baseball clubs to travel and play games, newspapers advertised and recorded the scores of the games and the game soon mirrored the fast-paced life of American cities. The development of professional baseball teams gave their cities identities and professionalism provided revenue for the owners, players and the local population. Progressives used baseball to socialize the masses, but a game that was started as a social club for the elite transformed into a national pastime that is open to everyone. 

Q: How did the building of projects and high-rises in areas such as the Bronx increase local crime?

During the ’20s and ’30s, the Bronx was a predominantly Jewish and white ethnic working- and middle-class community. Before 1940, African-Americans made up a small percentage of the Bronx’s total population, though they were more segregated than any other white ethnic group and lived in the borough’s oldest and worst housing.

During WWII, 5 million African-Americans migrated to the North searching for economic opportunity. Public entities sought a solution to the resulting overcrowding. While whites benefited disproportionately from subsidized low interest mortgage loans that were part of the New Deal and moved to the suburbs, low-income blacks received public housing. 

During the ’50s, the federal government built 16 public housing high rises, six of which were located in the South Bronx. Concerned that the too many white middle-class residents were leaving the Bronx, city planners encouraged subsidized housing for working-class families.

However, the construction of the Cross Bronx Expressway, which connected the suburbs to the city, destroyed solid working-class neighborhoods. The Bronx lost thousands of manufacturing jobs and hundreds of small businesses. As the tax based decreased, crime increased. As the economy worsened during the ’60s and ’70s, high school dropouts and the unemployed joined gangs for protection, social status and the opportunity to earn money by selling drugs.

By the late ’70s, the South Bronx was the poster child of urban blight. But in spite of the rise of gangs and poverty, the South Bronx birthed hip-hop music and culture in the ’80s. Now a billion-dollar industry, hip hop has gone mainstream and the Bronx has slowly rebounded.