Parallels in Popularity
By Trey Nosrac. Turn off your phone and imagine it's springtime in America.
Sixty-one professional baseball leagues, including two major leagues, prepared to play. Four hundred and fifty-seven professional minor league teams in four hundred and fifty-seven cities across forty-eight states awaited the new season.
Big Stone Gap, Virginia, home to the Big Stone Gap Rebels, prepared to take the field at Bullitt Park against the Oak Ridge Bombers from Tennessee.
1949 marked the beginning of the golden age of harness horse racing, with large crowds at racetracks like Yonkers and Roosevelt, operating in a dozen states.
Daily newspapers featured harness horses and participants, with many Americans familiar with racehorses like Good Times, Rodney, and Victory Song.
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Author's summary: America's sports scene flourished in 1949.