Work, Fight, or Play Ball: How Bethlehem Steel Helped Baseball's Stars Avoid World War I

In Work, Fight, or Play Ball, William Ecenbarger presents a skillful and well-written account of semi-professional industrial leagues during the First World War, highlighting the tension generated when war, business, and baseball intersected. This book is an informative and enjoyable read for fans interested in baseball's history, highlighting the understudied role of industrial baseball leagues. However, Work, Fight, or Play Ball does not fully explore all of the tensions and issues that Ecenbarger identifies. Much of the book favors a narrative style focused on players, teams, and game outcomes. While compelling, this focus comes at the expense of advancing a scholarly argument that engages existing baseball historiography.When the United States joined World War I and the federal government rushed to reach war readiness, all of American society—including baseball—was impacted by the war effort. The 1917 Major League Baseball season featured patriotic displays by teams and players. Soldiers threw out the first pitch of games, marching bands played “The Star-Spangled Banner” before games or during the seventh-inning stretch, and professional baseball players even practiced and performed marching drills in front of fans.Wartime team owners, Ecenbarger demonstrates, had a vested interest in walking a tightrope of national sentiment. Being labeled a “slacker” was effectively a type of social death. In addition, by making baseball part of the nation's wartime propaganda, teams hoped their players’ names would not be called for the draft, allowing the season to continue.When the 1917 season ended, many players lost the protection of their employment to avoid the draft. Athletes instead found employment in steel mills, where they could compete in industrial baseball leagues. Operated by plants for their workers, these industrial leagues boasted surprising levels of organization and popularity. Teams traveled to play clubs from rival factories and the seasons often culminated in highly anticipated championship series. First among these leagues was the Bethlehem Steel League. Purchased by the eccentric, briefly disgraced industrialist Charles M. Schwab, the Bethlehem Steel Plant became extremely profitable through its early production of H-beams, which facilitated the construction of skyscrapers. Ecenbarger captures Schwab's peculiarities, especially how his fervent anti-union stance led him to create and fund an entire baseball league in the hopes of dissuading workers from organizing labor unions.It was at best an open secret that factories hired professional players to compete in and draw crowds to industrial league games. In some cases, players did no work other than play baseball, but remained on payrolls nonetheless. Many particularly patriotic individuals asserted that these players were slackers and should never play in the majors again. Regardless, fans flocked to see icons like Babe Ruth and Shoeless Joe Jackson compete in semi-pro games. While wartime industrial leagues never reached anything resembling this level of popularity again, in 1917 and 1918 they achieved a symbiotic relationship with star baseball players trying to avoid military service. In exchange for shelter from the war and easy pay, professional baseball players brought attention and profit to the industrial leagues.Ecenbarger's account of this moment in baseball history is well written and demonstrates committed research and a passion for the game. The author draws upon the works of sport historians and many local and national newspapers to weave a compelling narrative. The book's first three chapters are particularly strong. In these early chapters, Ecenbarger establishes the complex political, social, and personal realities exerting influence over teams and players. Although Ecenbarger lacks a uniting argument or historiographical intervention, his book certainly has much to offer baseball history enthusiasts.In the early chapters, Ecenbarger reconstructs the political and cultural context Major League Baseball and its athletes navigated during the First World War. Readers learn about the personal experiences of players like Ruth, who happily took full advantage of the deal offered by the industrial leagues, and Jackson, who felt guilty about not going to war but chose to stay at home with his family. For baseball fans, this book places very familiar characters into a new light and is an enjoyable, informative read.At its core, the story of the industrial leagues is one of tension between corporate interests and the federal government's desire to exert control and execute a war, with workers caught in the middle. Such tensions persist throughout Ecenbarger's book but remain largely uninterrogated. As a result, scholars may feel frustrated that Ecenbarger does not do more to engage established baseball historiography.Work, Fight, or Play Ball is deeply invested, above all, in the particularities of the industrial leagues and the famous players who used them to avoid the draft. This focus comes at the expense of developing a more incisive thesis. Ecenbarger dedicates much of the book's second half to descriptions of teams and a summary of the 1917 season. While interesting, the second half of the book is a chronicle that is light on meaningful analysis and does not build on the promising first three chapters.Ultimately, Work, Fight, or Play Ball is a novel account of the national pastime during wartime. Ecenbarger has isolated a unique moment in baseball's history and written about it with an exciting and enjoyable style. Work, Fight, or Play Ball will appeal to fans interested in baseball history. At its best, Ecenbarger's narrative approach immerses the reader in the zeitgeist of the Deadball Era and World War I America. It is an informative book; however, it does not make a critical, historiographical intervention within the history of baseball. Scholars will likely be left wanting more. Nevertheless, baseball historians will likely find Work, Fight, or Play Ball to be a useful starting point for subsequent inquiry.