Fifty-Nine in '84

Fifty-nine in '84 is award-winning journalist Edward Achorn's riveting history of late nineteenth century baseball and the era's most legendary pitcher.In 1884, Providence Grays pitcher Charles 'Old Hoss' Radbourn won an astounding fifty-nine games-more than anyone in major-league history ever had before, or has since. He then went on to win all three games of baseball's first World Series.Fifty-nine in '84 tells the dramatic story not only of that amazing feat of grit but also of big-league baseball two decades after the Civil War-a brutal, bloody sport played barehanded, the profession of uneducated, hard-drinking men who thought little of cheating outrageously or maiming an opponent to win.Wonderfully entertaining, Fifty-nine in '84 is an indelible portrait of a legendary player and a fascinating, little-known era of the national pastime.'A beautifully written, meticulously researched story about a bygone baseball era that even die-hard fans will find foreign, and about a pitcher who might have been the greatest of all time.' -Joseph J. Ellis, Pulitzer Prize-winning historian 'First-class narrative history that can stand with everything Steven Ambrose wrote. . . . Achorn's description of the utter insanity that was barehanded baseball is vivid and alive.' -Boston Globe