On this day in 1870, 24-year-old amateur pitcher Fred Goldsmith held a public exhibition at the Capitoline Grounds in Brooklyn. Among the things that the right-handed pitcher did at the event was demonstrate his curveball, a pitch which to this point had been considered merely an optical illusion; proving that it moved in fact and not only in appearance, he bent it through three stakes that were stuck in the ground. Hall of Fame journalist Henry Chadwick, the so-called “father of baseball” who allegedly invented the box score and early statistics, was in attendance, writing in the newspaper the following day, “That which had up to this point been considered an optical illusion and against all rules of philosophy was now an established fact.
Ahead of the Curve: The controversial origins of the curveball
