2009 Cooperstown Symposium program listing

Pulitzer-winning author Ira Berkow gave the keynote address at the 2008 Symposium. (Milo Stewart Jr.)

Wednesday, June 3

1:00 p.m. to 2:00 p.m. — Keynote Address (Grandstand Theater)

  • Welcome to Cooperstown
    Jeff Idelson; President - National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum

  • Greetings from SUNY-Oneonta
    Bill Simons; Cooperstown Symposium Director - State University of New York at Oneonta

  • Keynote address: Title to be determined
    Paul Dickson; Garrett Park, Md.

2:15 p.m. to 3:30 p.m. — Concurrent Session 1

    Panel: Baseball and the Law (Bullpen Theater)

  • William S. Stevens (1948-2008) and "The Common Law Origins of the Infield Fly Rule"
    Alexander Sanders; Charleston School of Law

  • The Legislative Battle for Sunday Baseball in New York During the Progressive Age
    Charles DeMotte; Onondaga Community College

  • Examining the Black Sox Scandal Through the Lens of Contract Law
    Keith Rowley; University of Nevada at Las Vegas Law School

    Panel: The International Game (Education Gallery)

  • World Ball: A Work in Progress
    Robert Lewis; University of New Mexico

  • Cuba's National Pastimes: Baseball and Politics
    Allen Wells; Bowdoin College

  • The Crowd Began to Shout "Atta Boy" With a Lancashire Accent: The English Response to Baseball Exhibition Games in the Early 20th Century
    Beth Hise; Marylebone Cricket Club Museum - London, England

3:45 p.m. to 5:00 p.m. — Concurrent Session 2

    Panel: Baseball and Labor (Bullpen Theater)

  • At the Brink of Free Agency - Creating the Foundation for the Messersmith-McNally Decision - 1968-1975
    Ed Edmonds; University of Notre Dame Law School

  • 1981: The Season That Almost Wasn't
    Jeff Katz; Cooperstown, N.Y.

  • Have We Seen the Last of Baseball's Labor Wars?
    Paul Staudohar; California State University - East Bay

    Panel: New Perspectives (Education Gallery)

  • Measuring Success: Field Dimensions and Women's Baseball
    Anne Aronson; Metropolitan State University - St. Paul

  • J.C Leyendecker, Baseball & the Creation of the Iconic American Male Image
    Andrew Wentink; Middlebury College

  • Andrew Wentink; Middlebury College
    Elizabeth O'Connell; State University of New York - Stony Brook

  • Plié Ball!: Baseball in American Dance
    Jeffrey Katz; University of British Columbia

6:30 p.m. to 8:00 p.m. — Plenary Session 1 (Grandstand Theater)

  • Baseball and Freedom III: Remembering Mr. Powles
    George Nicholson; Judge, Court of Appeals - State of California
    Rockwell Jones; President, Ohio Wesleyan University
    Branch Rickey III; President, Pacific Coast League
    Hugh Hewitt; Chapman University School of Law
    Brad Snyder; University of Wisconsin Law School
    Other panelists to be determined

Thursday, June 4

9:00 a.m. to 10:00 a.m. — Plenary Session 2 (Grandstand Theater)

  • Abraham Lincoln: Politics, The Law, and Baseball as a Basis for American Leadership
    Frank Williams; Chief Justice, Supreme Court for the State of Rhode Island

10:15 a.m. to 11:45 — Concurrent Session 3

  • Panel: Baseball and Antitrust (Bullpen Theater)
    Trust, Antitrust and Curt Flood

    John Eastman; Chapman University School of Law (moderator)
    Brad Snyder; University of Wisconsin School of Law
    John Tehranian; Chapman University School of Law
    Lee Lowenfish; New York, N.Y.
    Branch Rickey, III; Pacific Coast League

  • Panel: Women in Baseball (Education Gallery)
    Skirting the Game: The Growing Role of Women in Baseball Scholarship

    Jean Ardell-Hastings; Corona-del-Mar, California (moderator)
    Roberta Newman; New York University
    Anne Aronson; Metropolitan State University - St. Paul
    Other panelists to be determined

1:15 p.m. to 2:30 p.m. — Concurrent Session 4

    Panel: Personalities of the Game (Bullpen Theater)

  • "I'll Throw This One Out and Duck" - Don Burley and the Sound of Black Baseball Hall of Fame
    Lawrence Hogan; Union County College
    Robert Cvornyek; Rhode Island College

  • The Rev. Billy Sunday: Fire Around the Bases and Brimstone Along the Sawdust Trail
    Oren Renick; Texas State University
    Judy Renick; San Marcos, Texas

  • The Plantation Owner and Brother Vida Blue: Charley Finley, Vida Blue and the Politics of Race in Oakland
    Ron Briley; Sandia Preparatory School

    Panel: Baseball and Integration (Education Gallery)

  • A Calculus of Color: The Slow Integration of the American League
    Robert McGregor; University of Illinois

  • A Generation Too Early?: Integration in the Short-Lived Interstate League of 1926
    Geri Strecker; Ball State University

  • Jim Gilliam and Elston Howard: Exemplars of the Desegregation of Major League Baseball Management
    Richard Puerzer; Hofstra University

2:45 p.m. to 5:00 p.m. — Concurrent Session 5

    Panel: Black Baseball (Bullpen Theater)

  • The East-West All-Star Classic: More Than Meets the Eye?
    Kenneth Winter; University of Wisconsin - LaCrosse

  • Negro League Baseball's Daily Numbers
    Roberta Newman; New York University
    Joel Nathan Rosen; Moravian College

  • "Take It Easy, Don't Give Me No Lip" - Durocher's Management Style and Integrating Baseball
    Jeffrey Marlett; College of Saint Rose

    Panel: Baseball - The Early Days (Education Gallery)

  • A Simple Plan: A.G. Spalding's 'America's National Game' as an Allegory for the Reordering of American Hierarchies in 1911
    Michael Civille; Boston College

  • Baseball's Utopian Performative Moment
    Tim Good; DePauw University

  • The Federal League: A Truly 'Federal' Legacy
    David Bohmer; DePauw University

5:00 p.m. to 6:45 p.m. — Plenary Session 3 (Cooper Park in front of the library)

  • Town Ball Game (weather permitting)
    Tom Heitz; Fly Creek, N.Y. (Umpire and instructor)

7:00 p.m. to 9:00 p.m. — Dinner (Hall of Fame Plaque Gallery)
Admission ticket required for dinner.

Friday, June 5

9:00 a.m. to 10:30 a.m. — Concurrent Session 6

    Panel: Law and Economics (Bullpen Theater)

  • The New York Yankees Cope With The Great Depression
    David Surdam; University of Northern Iowa

  • Reading Judge Landis: How His Published Court Rulings Foretold the Actions of Baseball's First Commissioner
    Theodore Curtis; Lynn University

  • The Sovereign Nation of Baseball: Why Federal Law Does Not Apply to "America's Game" and How It Got That Way
    Mitchell Nathanson; Villanova University School of Law

    Panel: Baseball in Literature (Education Gallery)

  • Baseball in the American Hinterlands: Barnstorming the Graphic Novel
    Bill Simons; State University of New York - Oneonta

  • Pastoralism, Progress, and the Professional Game in Lucy Kennedy's "The Sunlet Field" and Darryl Brock's "If I Never Get Back"
    Trey Strecker; Ball State University

  • American Morality Tale: "Nobody Don't Like Yogi" A Play by Thomas Lysaght
    Mark Altschuler; Bergen Community College

10:45 a.m. to noon — Concurrent Session 7

    Panel: Monuments and Memorials (Bullpen Theater)

  • The Reaction in Honolulu, Hawaii, and Consequential Impact on Cooperstown, New York Regarding Recognition of Alexander Cartwright
    Monica Nucciarone; Pierce College

  • A Monument to Musial: A Statue Few People Like Becomes A Memorial Everyone Loves
    Joseph Stanton; University of Hawaii

  • Hooks Wiltse Returns: A Prototype of Community Resurrection of a Lost Native Son
    Richard Cohen; Hamilton, N.Y.

    Panel: Baseball Iconography (Education Gallery)

  • Heading For Home: Baseball and Father-Son Relationships in "Shoeless Joe" and" Field of Dreams"
    Willie Steele; Cascade College

  • The Player as Player: Two Careers in Film and Baseball
    George Grella; University of Rochester

  • Wanted: Fist Pumps, Bat Flips, and Excessive Celebration; Flatliners Need Not Apply
    Lisa Neilson; Marist College

1:00 p.m. to 2:15 p.m. — Concurrent Session 8

    Panel: The Babe (Bullpen Theater)

  • Babe Ruth in Dennis Lehane's "The Given Day"
    Thomas Wolf; Chapel Hill, N.C.
    Patricia Bryan; University of North Carolina Law School

  • Babe Ruth: The Boss of the Youth of America
    Charlie Poekel; Local 74 USWU Legal Fund

  • Babe Ruth: The Final Two Years
    William Maloney; New York University

    Panel: Music and Poetry (Education Gallery)

  • Music and Baseball
    Steven Lubin; State University of New York - Purchase

  • A Reading From Rules of the Game: Baseball Poems
    Marjorie Maddox; Lock Haven University

  • Take Me Out to the Ball Game: The Reluctant Signifyer for Reform
    George Boziwick; New York Public Library for the Performing Arts

2:30 p.m. to 3:30 p.m. — Concurrent Session 9

    Panel: Baseball and America 1(Bullpen Theater)

  • Speaking Baseball: The Contribution of the Game to American English
    Joyce Milambiling; University of Northern Iowa

  • More Amazin' Than You Imagine
    Steve Jacobson; Long Beach, N.Y.

  • Baseball and Fastpitch Softball Experiences of International Female Baseball Players
    Justine Siegal; Springfield College

  • Sports Vision and Baseball: Does the Number of Papers Concerning the Skill-Set of Playing Baseball Reflect Its Current Status
    Kenneth Seger; Nova Southeastern University

    Panel: Baseball and America 2 (Education Gallery)

  • The Little Lefty
    Wayne Patterson; National Science Foundation

  • Ty Cobb: The Culture of Honor
    Steve Tripp; Grand Valley State University

  • Baseball for the Insane: The Middletown Hospital Asylums
    Jim Overmyer; Lenox, Mass.

3:45 p.m. to 5:00 p.m. — Concurrent Session 10

    Panel: Baseball Documentary (Bullpen Theater)

  • Baseball in the Dunes: A Documentary Film

    Kathy Heller; Chapman University School of Law (moderator)
    Christopher Rufo; Documentary Foundation
    Colin Legerton; Documentary Foundation
    Peter Jordan; Documentary Foundation

Panel: Baseball and Native American (Educational Gallery)

  • Chiefly Shameful: From Chief Bender to Chief Nockahoma and Chief Wahoo - Baseball's Historical and Continuing Mistreatment of Native Americans
    Ed Rice; Eastern Maine Community College (moderator)
    Joseph Oxendine; University of North Carolina - Pembroke
    Jeffrey Beck; East Tennessee State University
    Michael Taylor; Colgate University

6:00 p.m. to 7:30 p.m. — Plenary Session 4 (Bullpen Theater)

  • Diamond in the Dunes

    Work-in progress screening of the baseball documentary

67:30 p.m. to 8:30 p.m. — Reception (Giamatti Center)

  • Light refreshments to be served.