Little League Baseball

In 1995, Toms River, New Jersey, sent a team to the Little League Baseball World Series in Williamsport, Pennsylvania, that was loaded with talent and considered one of the favorites to win the Little League Championship that year. However, games are won on the field of play and that particular team failed to advance past the qualifying round, leaving many people in the New Jersey community disappointed.

Not in Finland! Baseball is so popular among the Finns that nearly 10% of the Finnish population are active participants in the game. All schoolchildren learn to play baseball at school. Thousands of boys and girls between the ages of 9 and 19 participate in organized baseball leading to an annual championship. The Finnish National Baseball Association is among the largest sports federations in Finland, with over 60,000 active athletes. At schools throughout the country it is the most popular game among girls.

For many years the assumption was made that baseball was derived from the British game of cricket. Today however, sport historians are re-evaluating this claim. Recent historical discoveries point to the fact that baseball resembles more the game brought to America by the early Polish settlers of Jamestown, Virginia (1609) known as "pilka palantowa". Zbigniew Stefanski in his "Pamietnik Handlowca" ("An Industrialist's Memoirs") of 1625, gives the facts of the Polish game and even names some of its players.

Beginning with the start of the year 2000 baseball season, the Copernicus Society of America has initiated a local effort in the Philadelphia area to collect a total of 2,000 new and used baseball gloves for underprivileged Little Leaguers around the world. "Pitch in a glove for Little League" encourages individuals to donate a brand new baseball glove or search in their basement, attic, closet or garage at home to find a glove to give to the effort.