During the first 45 years of Major League Baseball, any person who desired to know the events of a game had to be present at the ballpark or at the location at which the game was being played. Fortunately, for the game of baseball and for the American people, in 1921, radio stations began broadcasting baseball games to the American people who could not be at the ballpark, whether it was a financial matter, if the venue was sold out, or if the people were simply unable to make it in time to see the game. American economic prosperity of the 1920s, along with the growth of materialism, beneficially affected both the radio and Major League Baseball, which beneficially affected each other and the American people. During the 1920s, America had
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Whether someone was listening to a ballgame a block from the ballpark, in a suburban area an hour away, or listening on a farm in Nebraska, all of these people were listening to the same broadcast. “The advent of radio” connected these everyday Americans in a way that had never been done before (Westphal baseball). These people could all talk about the game as if they had been there themselves, feeling as if they were there while listening “to these fabulous sounds from the Old Sportsman’s park in St. Louis, or sometimes from… Shibe Park or Wrigley Field in the afternoons, or the Polo Grounds” (Morris Baseball). Baseball became so popular on the radio that it became “part of the background music of America” (McDowell Baseball). Baseball games would be played on the radio virtually everywhere, from barbershops to delis to ice cream parlors, constantly a background to all conversation (McDowell Baseball). The spread of the radio to suburban and rural areas of the United States helped spread the game of baseball throughout the entire country, supplying people who did not have nearly the amount of entertainment available as in cities with a good form of entertainment. The spread of radio also united Americans from all corners of the massive nation and became a constant part of their everyday
Whether someone was listening to a ballgame a block from the ballpark, in a suburban area an hour away, or listening on a farm in Nebraska, all of these people were listening to the same broadcast. “The advent of radio” connected these everyday Americans in a way that had never been done before (Westphal baseball). These people could all talk about the game as if they had been there themselves, feeling as if they were there while listening “to these fabulous sounds from the Old Sportsman’s park in St. Louis, or sometimes from… Shibe Park or Wrigley Field in the afternoons, or the Polo Grounds” (Morris Baseball). Baseball became so popular on the radio that it became “part of the background music of America” (McDowell Baseball). Baseball games would be played on the radio virtually everywhere, from barbershops to delis to ice cream parlors, constantly a background to all conversation (McDowell Baseball). The spread of the radio to suburban and rural areas of the United States helped spread the game of baseball throughout the entire country, supplying people who did not have nearly the amount of entertainment available as in cities with a good form of entertainment. The spread of radio also united Americans from all corners of the massive nation and became a constant part of their everyday