NINE: A Journal of Baseball History & Culture seeks
to promote the study of all historical aspects of baseball and
centers on the cultural implications of the game wherever in the
world baseball is played. The journal reflects an eclectic
approach and does not foster a particular ideological bias.
For more information about the journal, including submission
guidelines, subscription information, and the current table of
contents, please follow this link.
NINE: A Journal of Baseball History and Culture announces
The 19th Annual NINE Spring Training Conference
on the Historical and Sociological Impact of
Baseball
Wednesday, March 7-Saturday, March 10, 2012
Fiesta Resort Conference Center
2100 South Priest Drive
Tempe, Arizona
The 2012 conference schedule is linked
here.
Call for Papers: The 19th Annual NINE
Spring Training Conference
invites
original, unpublished papers that study all aspects of baseball,
with particular emphasis on history and social policy
implications. Abstracts only, not to exceed 300 words, should
be submitted by December 2, 2011, to:
NINE Spring Training Conference
c/o Trey Strecker
Department of English
Ball State University
Muncie, Indiana 47306-0460
Email:
tstrecker@bsu.edu
Email abstracts are preferred. Authors will be notified as
quickly as possible whether their papers have been accepted.
Authors are required to register for the conference and present
their work in person.
Information about
conference and hotel registration is
here.
Keynote Speaker: Rob Fitts
Rob Fitts graduated from the
University of Pennsylvania and received a Ph.D. from Brown
University. Originally trained as an archeologist of
colonial America, Fitts left that field in 2000 to focus on his
passion, Japanese baseball. He has since published
numerous articles and three books on the topic. The first,
Remembering Japanese Baseball: An Oral History of the Game,
won the 2005 SABR/Sporting News Award for Best Baseball
Research. His second book, Wally Yonamime: The Man Who
Changed Japanese Baseball, is a biography of the first
American to play professional baseball in Japan after World War
II. Banzai Babe Ruth: Baseball, Espionage, and
Assassination during the 1934 Tour of Japan (forthcoming
early in 2012) is the story of the attempt to reconcile the
United States and Japan through the tour of Major League
all-stars in 1934 and the efforts of fanatical
ultra-nationalists to drive the nations apart. The story
involves international diplomacy, espionage, attempted murder,
and, of course, baseball.
Featured Guest: Ila Borders
An all-star Little League prodigy, at age 12
Ila Borders hit 18 home runs. She was named MVP in her
junior high and high school years, and in 1994 became the first
woman ever awarded a collegiate baseball scholarship. That
year, pitching for Southern California College (NAIA), she
stepped into history as the first woman to post a complete-game
victory in men's collegiate baseball. In 1997, scout Barry
Moss recommended Borders to Mike Veeck, who signed her to his
St. Paul Saints of the independent Northern League. In
1998, pitching for the Duluth-Superior Dukes of the same league,
Borders became the first woman to win a men's professional game
since Mamie "Peanut" Johnson of the Negro leagues. Borders
ultimately pitched four seasons of professional baseball.
She currently works as a firefighter/paramedic in Arizona and
coaches baseball for the World Children's Baseball Fair.
She is completing a memoir of her life and times in baseball.