OT: Baseball historians -- a couple questions

[Anthony S.]

Was hoping someone could provide me with a couple approximate dates for the beginning/end of certain baseball traditions.

1) When did it become common practice for fans to be able to keep foul balls hit into the stands? And were there any specific teams who pioneered this practice and if so when? Did any teams (presumably smaller market) drag their feet?

2) When did fielders stop leaving their gloves on the field for the other team to use. I seem to remember seeing that happen in "8 Men Out." Was that an anachronism?

edited to add: IGNORE the "for the other team to use" part of the 2nd question. Lame assumption on my part.

[brickyardkennedy]

http://wiki.answers.com/Q/When_were_...to_this_policy

I'm pretty sure the practice of leaving gloves on the field survived into the forties and maybe fifties, even. It definitely would not have been an anachronism in the film "Eight Men Out".

[Potomac Yank]

I recall seeing the gloves being left out on the field during the late 1940's.

However, this is the first time that I've heard that they were left there for the other teams use ..... not everyone is a lefty, or a righty, and besides, gloves are a very personal thing to a ball player.

[Anthony S.]

Thanks for clarifying that, Joe. Just an erroneous assumption on my part.

[whitehse]

One of my favorite shows of all time is the series HBO did some years back called "When It Was a Game." This show featured home movies of different baseball era's and I remember seeing many times that players well into the 1950's would toss their gloves on the field while heading back to the dugout. I seem to recall this practice stopped in the mid to late 50's.

I have never heard that the gloves were available for the other team to use. I have heard many stories from former players where they would pull pranks on the other players by leaving various items in opponents gloves like frogs, and other objects.

[brickyardkennedy]

You reminded me Andrew, of Eldon Auker mentioning in his book, Oscar Mellilo's extreme fear of small animals (frogs, snakes, bugs) and how that would lead to them showing up in his glove, thus causing him to go into fits. : )