An illustration of trap-ball from Juvenile Sports or Youth's Pastimes, ca. 1820

Engraving by the pioneer woodcut artist Alexander Anderson. Children's Amusements, 1820

Good Examples for Boys, 1823. Yes, disaster looms, but rest assured that the boy will learn an important moral lesson.

This explanation of how to play the game of rounders--from The Boy's Own Book, 1828--is the earliest known description of a baseball-like game to appear in English. The name rounders was adopted in England in the early 19th century, but the game itself was at least a century older, and was known as "base-ball"!

What game are they playing? The bats are not a traditional shape for either cricket or baseball, and that thick post sticking up behind the batter does not resemble either a cricket wicket or an old-style baseball goal. The image comes from Watts' Divine and Moral Songs, 1833.