THE HAPPY HIGHLANDER’S RECORDS Episode 11 - Baseball on 78 RPM
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THE HAPPY HIGHLANDER’S RECORDS
Episode 11
Baseball on 78 RPM
Fit like a’body. I hope you are all hale and hearty and most importantly, happy.
Hello friends, and welcome once again to The Happy Highlander's Records — where the crackle of shellac, the spin of a turntable, and the voices of the past come alive again.
Today’s programme is a grand slam for lovers of old records and old baseball alike. We’re stepping back into the golden age of America’s pastime through five wonderful sides of four vintage 78 rpm discs — recordings made when baseball was becoming more than just a game. It was becoming myth, entertainment, comedy, and part of everyday life.
Our line-up today includes the mighty Babe Ruth himself telling his own “Home Run Story,” the immortal baseball anthem “Take Me Out to the Ball Game,” a comic country tale from Cal Stewart’s Uncle Josh series, and of course one of the greatest comedy routines ever recorded — Abbott and Costello’s “Who’s on First?”
These records come from a time when families gathered around wind-up gramophones, when shellac discs spun at 78 revolutions per minute, and when radio and records helped turn baseball heroes into national celebrities.
Some of these recordings are over a century old, yet they still have charm, humour, and personality that modern recordings sometimes struggle to match.
So settle in, imagine the smell of old varnished wood and fresh-cut grass at the ballpark, and let’s enjoy a little baseball history — one groove at a time.
Our first selection today comes from one of the biggest sports legends who ever lived - Babe Ruth. This 1920 recording, “Babe” Ruth’s Home Run Story, was issued on the Actuelle label by the Pathé Frères Phonograph Company during the very height of Ruth’s rise to superstardom.
In 1920, Ruth hit an astonishing 54 home runs for the New York Yankees, completely changing the way baseball was played and watched. Before Ruth, baseball was dominated by bunts, steals, and low-scoring strategy.
Ruth made the home run the main attraction. Now here’s a fun bit of record collecting mystery: although the label proudly claims this is “by Babe himself,” many historians believe the voice on the record may actually be an actor imitating Ruth rather than the Babe himself. Even experts at the Baseball Hall of Fame have questioned whether it is truly Ruth speaking.
Still, authentic or not, the record captures the excitement surrounding Ruth in 1920. He was becoming America’s first true sports celebrity. His face appeared everywhere - advertisements, newspapers, vaudeville stages, even cereal boxes and underwear endorsements.
And one more remarkable statistic before we listen: Ruth’s 54 home runs in 1920 were so extraordinary that no other player hit more than 19 that season. In fact, Ruth nearly out-homered entire teams by himself. So now, from 1920, here is “Babe” Ruth’s Home Run Story.
Now we move back even earlier — all the way to 1908 — for perhaps the most famous baseball song ever written: Take Me Out to the Ball Game by the Haydn Quartet.
Even people who know very little about baseball usually know the chorus to this song. For more than a century it has been sung during the seventh-inning stretch at ballparks across America, becoming the unofficial anthem of baseball itself.
What makes the song especially amusing is that the two men who wrote it - Jack Norworth and Albert Von Tilzer - had apparently never attended a baseball game when they composed it. They simply wrote it from imagination and newspaper descriptions of the sport.
This Victor recording by the Haydn Quartet was made in September of 1908 and became one of the biggest musical hits of the era. The quartet featured some of the leading recording artists of the acoustic recording age, when singers had to crowd around a giant recording horn because microphones did not yet exist.
Another charming detail is that the song’s original verses are about a baseball-mad young woman named Katie Casey, proving that women baseball fans were part of the culture long before modern times. Most people today only know the chorus.
And think about this: when this record was made, the World Series itself was only five years old, and baseball legends like Ty Cobb and Honus Wagner were still active stars.
So let’s wind the clock back to 1908 and hear the Haydn Quartet perform Take Me Out to the Ball Game.
Our next selection is a delightful comic monologue from 1909: Uncle Josh Playing Baseball by Cal Stewart. Cal Stewart was one of the great humourists of the early recording era.
His famous character, Uncle Josh Weathersby, was a lovable country farmer forever getting tangled up in modern city life and newfangled inventions.
Stewart recorded dozens of these comic sketches in the early 1900s, and they became enormously popular on cylinder records and later on discs.
In this recording, Uncle Josh attempts to understand — and participate in — the increasingly popular game of baseball. And much of the humour comes from the clash between rural old-fashioned thinking and the fast-changing modern world.
Now remember, in 1909 baseball was exploding in popularity across America. Professional teams were becoming national celebrities, newspapers covered games in detail, and fans argued statistics with the same passion they do today.
What makes this record especially interesting is that it preserves the style of humour audiences loved over a century ago. The pacing is different, the accents are theatrical, and the storytelling feels almost like listening to an old front-porch tale.
And here’s a fun historical detail: Cal Stewart’s recordings sold in huge numbers at a time when people were just beginning to buy gramophones for home entertainment. In many homes, these comedy records would have been played over and over again for visiting friends and family. So now, from Victor Records in 1909, here is Cal Stewart as Uncle Josh in Uncle Josh Playing Baseball.
And finally today, we arrive at one of the most famous comedy routines ever recorded Who’s on First? by Bud Abbott and Lou Costello. By the time this 1953 recording was issued, Abbott and Costello were already comedy legends from radio, film, and television. But Who’s on First? had actually been part of their act for many years before this recording.
The genius of the routine is beautifully simple: Costello tries to understand the names of players on a baseball team, while Abbott calmly insists that “Who” is the first baseman, “What” is the second baseman, and “I Don’t Know” is the third baseman. The more Costello tries to clarify things, the more hopelessly confused he becomes. What’s remarkable is how timeless the routine remains.
Audiences still laugh at it today because the wordplay is so clever and the delivery so perfect. Many comedy historians consider it one of the finest examples of verbal comedy ever performed.
Another interesting fact: the routine was so iconic that it has been preserved in the United States National Recording Registry for its cultural importance. And unlike our earlier records today, this 1953 pressing comes from the post-war recording era, when microphones and electrical recording had greatly improved sound quality. So you’ll notice a much fuller and clearer sound compared with the acoustic discs from 1908 and 1909.
We’ll hear both sides of the record today, because once Abbott and Costello get going, stopping halfway through would almost be a crime.
So take your positions on the diamond, and enjoy Abbott and Costello performing Who’s on First?
Well friends, as the final grooves spin to a stop and the last echoes fade into the crackle of shellac, we’ve travelled today through nearly half a century of baseball history — from the optimism of 1908, through the roaring fame of Babe Ruth in the 1920s, and onward to the timeless comedy of Abbott and Costello in the 1950s.
These old 78 rpm records are more than entertainment. They’re little time machines. Each scratch and hiss carries voices, laughter, music, and memories from another age — reminders of packed ballparks, neighbourhood gramophones, and evenings when families gathered together simply to listen.
Baseball has always been called America’s pastime, but today these records also reminded us of something else: that joy itself can be timeless. Whether it’s the excitement of a home run, the crowd singing Take Me Out to the Ball Game, or the confusion of “Who’s on First?”, happiness has a wonderful way of surviving across generations.
And perhaps that’s the real magic of collecting and sharing old records — not just preserving history, but preserving the smiles that came with it.
This edition was recorded on an island off the West coast of Scotland where my collection of some 160,000 old shellac records is lovingly kept – to preserve, record and share these sounds from the past at 78rpm.
You can listen to more episodes via my website TheHappyHighlandersRecords.com and you can also listen to recordings of each individual record via my YouTube Channel Scottish Island Records.
I’ll leave you today with a lovely quote from Walt Whitman, who once wrote: “Happiness, not in another place but this place… not for another hour, but this hour.” And I think these old records prove exactly that.
This has been The Happy Highlander’s Records. Thank you for listening, and until next time — keep your needle sharp, your turntable turning, and your spirits high.
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