Live All You Can

Live All You Can is so engaging I read it in two sittings. This book is by the far the most comprehensive record of Alexander Joy Cartwright's life yet available. -- Robert Hamblin, author of Win or Win: A Season with Ron Shumate Jay Martin has given us a John Dewey with a passion for education and a passion for democracy, a man with an open spirit not only for America but also for the changes that swept China and Russia in the earliest decades of the twentieth century; a man who avoided academic inflation, grandstanding, and oratorical excess; a man with a passion above all for plainness and decency, the Harry Truman of American thinkers. Not only Dewey's thought but his life was democratic, as Jay Martin shows in this fine new psychologically revealing biography. A splendid achievement. -- Robert D. Richardson, Author of Henry Thoreau: A Life of the Mind

Laying waste to the notion that Abner Doubleday established the modern game of baseball, acclaimed biographer Jay Martin makes a bold case for A. J. Cartwright (1820-1892), an entrepreneur, philanthropist, and avid ballplayer whose keen perception and restless spirit codified the rules of the sport and engineered its rapid spread throughout the country. Consulting Cartwright's personal correspondence and papers, Martin shows how this American archetype synthesized a number of elements from popular ballgames into the program, bylaws, and positions we find on the field today. After formalizing his blueprint, Cartwright worked tirelessly to promote baseball nationwide, appealing to both upper- and lower-class spectators and ballplayers and weaving a trail of influence across nineteenth-century America. Addressing the controversy that has roiled for years around the claims for Doubleday and Cartwright, Martin revisits the original arguments behind each camp and throws into sharp relief the competing ambitions of these figures during a time of aggressive westward expansion and unparalleled opportunities for individual reinvention. Martin's story of modern baseball not only offers a fascinating window into a thoroughly American phenomenon but also accesses a rare history of American ideals.