This is an iHeart podcast. Guaranteed human. Liberty has never been just a word to we Americans. It has guided every one of our endeavors for the past 250 years, and now it takes form in a new way. The 2026 Semi-Quincentennial Coin and Metal Program from the United States Mint.
It celebrates the founding ideals that have long shaped our coinage. Available one year only, this historic collection features new coin designs, limited edition releases, and reissues. Shop new official coins at usmint.gov forward slash semi-q. That's usmint.gov/slash S-E-M-I-Q. I turned off news altogether.
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Try the new Tropical Butterfly Refresher from Starbucks. This is Lee Habib and this is Our American Stories, the show where America is the star and the American people coming to you from the city where the West begins, Fort Worth, Texas. Baseball evolved from bat and ball games brought to the new country during the 17th and early 18th centuries. From the late 1850s throughout the 1860s, baseball exploded in popularity and became, as Walt Whitman famously said, Our game. America's game with the snap go fling of the American atmosphere.
Here to tell another story is Ashley Lubinsky. Take it away, Ashley. When you look back in time, there are some things that you expect to see on a battlefield, and there are some things you don't.
So, obviously, you will see cannonballs and other types of ammunition and weapons, and especially during the American Civil War, you find letters and photographs. Photography was an incredibly important part of documenting the war, and you would find things like pieces of uniform and other. items from camps. But something you may not Think about would be a baseball. But on the fields of the Battle of Shiloh, which was one of the bloodiest early clashes of the American Civil War, that's exactly what was found.
A small hand stitched ball. That was worn. Weathered and carried a simple inscription. picked up on the Battle of Shiloh. Before the war, to give you some context, baseball, which was often written in two words, so base, space, ball.
was already being played. but it wasn't yet the national pastime that we think about today. It was something that was regional. It was really popular in urban environments. And it was fragmented.
So different cities played by different rules. New York had their version, Massachusetts had another. There was no universal game. It was just kind of a shared idea. But then came the Civil War.
And you have to picture this: you've got young men from across the country who are brought together into these camps, Union and Confederate armies. And they brought a piece of themselves with them. And one of those things were games.
So in camp between drills, they would play baseball. And sometimes they say, even within earshot of the front lines, They played when they had the chance.
So, something that started as recreation became something way more. It was almost a common language. Men who had never met, who spoke with different accents, came from different states, and in some cases lived entirely different lives, could suddenly share something so simple. They shared a bat. Abu and a set of rules that were negotiated in real time.
This wasn't the baseball though that we know today. The ball was a lot softer. It was called a lemon peel, which was hand stitched and uneven. The bat was called a willow, and there were no gloves. Fielders caught line drives with their bare hands.
And the pitcher didn't throw overhand, he would deliver the ball underhand, much more like a toss or something in softball than a pitch. And the language that they used was different too.
So the batter was a striker. And ultimately, the game itself was less rigid, more fluid, and was shaped by whoever showed up that day. And there are, of course, a lot of stories that go along with them. There are stories of Union soldiers playing ball in camp while Confederate prisoners watched. But there are also stories of guards and prisoners joining in the same game.
And there are a few, they're rare, that claim opposing sides sometimes would informally interact through shared recreation. Because even in war, there were moments, they were brief, fragile moments, When men stepped out of the conflict, actually, it was incredibly common because they were living their lives as they moved. And so, in this instance, they decided to pick up a ball instead of a musket. It's important to understand the context, though, of this battle. And that's at Shiloh in April of 1862.
More than twenty thousand men were killed, wounded, or missing in just two days. This was violence on a scale Americans had never really seen before. And yet Amidst that violence, There was a moment of levity. There was a baseball there. That recovered ball, the one that was inscribed from the battlefield, was reportedly picked up by an African-American orderly, a man who was moving through the aftermath of destruction.
So it was a small object, but it carried a lot of weight. Because it tells us something essential. That even in the darkest moments of the war, soldiers carried pieces of their normal life with them. When the war ended in 1865, The soldiers who survived went home. and they brought that game with them.
Men who had learned baseball in the camp introduced it to their towns and communities, and this is when rules began to standardize. Clubs formed, and competitions grew. And within a generation, baseball was no longer regional, it was national. Today, at Shiloh National Military Park, that history is still alive. not just in monuments or markers, but in motion.
teams gather on those same grounds to play vintage baseball. They wear the period uniforms, they follow the Flexible rules, they catch their ball with bare hands, and they speak the language of the 1860s: of strikers, willows, and gentlemen's play. And this is really neat because it gives visitors a chance to watch history unfold, but not as a battle reenactment, which is so common for a site like that, but in something quieter. A game. Because baseball during the Civil War wasn't just a pastime, it seemed.
A bridge between regions and people, kind of this intermediary between war and peace. And it reminds us that history isn't only found in moments of conflict. Rather also in the spaces between them. On the fields of Shiloh, where thousands once fought and fell, you can still hear it if you listen closely. Not cannon fire, not marching orders, but the crack of a bat.
and the echo of a game that helped bring a nation back together. And a terrific job on the production, editing, and storytelling by our own Greg Hengler. And just a lovely story by Ashley Lubinsky: the story of Shiloh Battlefield and the birth of modern baseball on Our American Stories. This is Lee Habib, host of Our American Stories. Every day on this show, we tell stories of history, faith, business, love, loss, and your stories.
Send us your stories, small or large, to our email, oas at ouramericanstories.com. That's oas at ouramericanstories.com. We'd love to hear them and put them on the air. Our audience loves them too. Liberty has never been just a word to we Americans.
It has guided every one of our endeavors for the past 250 years. And now it takes form in a new way. The 2026 Semi-Quincentennial Coin and Metal Program from the United States Mint. It celebrates the founding ideals that have long shaped our coinage. Available one year only, this historic collection features new coin designs, limited edition releases, and reissues.
Shop new official coins at usmint.gov forward slash semi-q. That's usmint.gov/slash S-E-M-I-Q. This July 4th, come celebrate at America's Block Party, hosted by America 250. America's Block Party is a can't-miss 4th of July concert happening at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum. Experience music performances from major artists, patriotic tributes, and the kickoff to Giving Forth, helping to make July 4th the largest day of giving in American history.
It's more than just fireworks. Learn more about this landmark celebration at America250.org. Flowers fade. Cards get tossed. But a personalized song?
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