[Ads-l] Antedating of "Double" (Baseball)

[Ben Zimmer]

Slightly earlier in the same paper:

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The Times (Philadelphia), Sep. 14, 1875, p. 4, col. 3
Three base hits with a bad throw gave the Quakers one in the first
inning... a single by Zettlein and a double by McMullin, one in the seventh.
https://www.newspapers.com/clip/47781681/double/
---
The Times (Philadelphia), Oct. 11, 1875, p. 1, col. 6
The next inning was disastrous to the Blue Legs, Schafer, Wright, Barnes,
O'Rourke, McVey, Spalding and White hitting hard, there being a three-baser
and a couple of doubles.
https://www.newspapers.com/clip/47781568/double/
---

On Tue, Mar 31, 2020 at 8:34 PM Shapiro, Fred <fred.shapiro at yale.edu> wrote:

> In the entry for "double" as a noun, the OED seems not to include the very
> common baseball sense.  The earliest citation I have found is:
>
> 1875 _Times_ (Philadelphia) 29 Oct. 4/2 (Newspapers.com)  Two hits, one a
> doule by Fisler, and an error of Haug gave the Athletic two in the fifth
> inning.
>
> Fred Shapiro
>
>

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