Steven A. Riess, Horse Racing the Chicago Way: Gambling, Politics and Organized Crime, 1837-1911. (Syracuse: Syracuse University Press, 2022). Reviewed by Nicholas E. Sarantakes As the title indicates, Steven A. Riess studies the rise and fall of horse racing in Chicago in Horse Racing the Chicago Way: Gambling, Politics and Organized Crime, 1837-1911. However, as the…
Anderson, Ryan K. Frank Merriwell and the Fiction of All-American Boyhood: The Progressive Era Creation of the Schoolboy Sports Story. Fayetteville: The University of Arkansas Press, 2015. Pp. xxiv+220. Notes, photos, images, appendix, and index. $27.95 paper. Reviewed by Russ Crawford My first review for Sport in American History was of a book about the…
by Adam Park The Russo-Japanese War sparked American fascination with Japanese culture at the turn of the 20th century. “Japanese things are in fashion nowadays,” claimed one 1904 periodical, but “where does Japan get her muscle and pluck?”[1] They are “an intelligent, wholesome people; strong, clean and moral,” according to one representative source.[2] Indeed, Americans…
Sport in American History 