New York Times—Two issues, those of September 19 and September 22, carried a total of 9 inches of sports. The average for the two issues was 4½ inches, or about two-thirds of 1 per cent of the total space for reading-matter. Sport was restricted to baseball and horse-racing.
Nor was the style of sport writing conspicuously better east than west.
When Heenan fought Sayers for the championship in England the Tribune gave the event about 4500 words, taken from the London Times and other English papers. It took these papers, and the Tribune, nearly 1,000 words of the 4500 to get the train out to the fighting grounds and the men into the ring. The whole thing was chronological. The writers simply started at the beginning and let the chips of action and drama fall where they might. The writing simply wasn't modern. (3).
Now let us look at the New York Times of December 6, 1860, for the way a prizefight story of half a column was started. Even the headline took as long as possible to get down to the news. Here
THE PRIZE RING (black caps)
Desperate Fight Between Woods and King for a Purse of $300—Woods Declared the Victor.
And the lead, less chronological than in the Sayers-Heenan story, but not a very snappy model for the younger and smaller western papers to copy:
The long-anticipated and much-talked-of fight between John Woods, of Boston, and George King, from this city, came off yesterday morning at Bull's Ferry, N. J. (the same ground that Clarke and Harrigan fought on) for a purse of $300, and after fifty-five rounds were fought, Woods was declared the victor, King having "dropped" foul to avoid a blow. . . .
The status of eastern baseball writing in the 60's is indicated by the following sample story from the New York Herald of a championship baseball game attended by 15,000 persons at Brooklyn:
GRAND BASE BALL MATCH
The Atlantics Defeated—The Eckfords Champions
The Atlantic Base Ball Club have lost the enviable name of champions. Yesterday afternoon at least 15,000 persons assembled on and around the Union ground, at Brooklyn, to witness the final game for the silver ball and the champion ship. Since the establishment of the Atlantic Club they have never lost a match. The Eckfords beat their opponents at the commencement of the present season; but the Atlantics won
