Date:  Mon, 15 Dec 1997 22:21:15 -0500
From:  Gregory {Greg} Downing <downingg[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]IS2.NYU.EDU>
Subject: Re: 'Mudville"

At 09:24 PM 12/15/97 -0500, you (Alan Baragona <baragonasa[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]VAX.VMI.EDU>) wrote:
>> I have a sportswriter friend who swears that Mudville is actually Stockton,
>> California.
>
>This is not all that farfetched since Thayer was working for W.R. Hearst
>in San Francisco when he wrote the poem for the S.F. _Examiner_.
>However, Martin Gardner's _Annotated Casey at the Bat_ has the
>following:
>
>"In 1887, the year of the immortal game, Mudville was a farming village
>near the east border of Anderson County, Kansas, about sixty miles
>southeast of Topeka. It was on the south bank of Polecat Creek, seven
>miles west of where Centerville, in Linn County, is still located.
>Neither Mudville nor the creek exist today."
>
>I must admit, though, that the rest of Gardner's note makes me wonder if
>this account is serious. He continues "The poignant story of why and
>how Mudville faded from the map is told by Grantland Rice in his poem,
>'Mudville's Fate.'" And then Gardner recounts the story of the poem as
>if it were historically accurate, even though it mentions Casey and his
>wife and 8 children.
>
>If anyone can find a map of Kansas circa 1887, perhaps Mudville will be
>on it.
>

I too would be somewhat skeptical, since this is the type of situation in
which I have often seen the drive to identify a "real" place when it is
deliberately generic and fictional. Is there anything about the poem in
question that seems to demand a particular historical location? It's the
story of a guy who thinks he's a big shot, and (acting cavalierly) strikes
out at the big moment in the game. When did Thayer have information about or
an association with Kansas?

Anyway, there *is* a set of maps of the US in great detail as of 1895, and
genealogical types have put them on the internet, though be warned that they
are quite large and will take a minute or two longer than forever to
download unless you have a fast modem. It is important not to rely on a
modern atlas; names have changed a lot all over the country since then, as I
know from several local regions with whose history I am somewhat familiar.
For the 1895 US atlas go to:

http://www.ismi.net/lcmigw/1895.htm

and click on the box for Kansas. There's no Mudville in eastern Anderson
County. All named locations in Kansas that are reflected in the 1895 atlas
are listed, in alpha order, with information about them at. Try "M" at:

http://www.ismi.net/lcmigw/atksm.htm

There's no Mudville there, just a VERY small settlement Mudrow in Sherman
Co. in the NW part of the state.

Those who are interested in the real-Mudville theory might check the "M"
page in the indexes for Massachusetts and Calif, and (for that matter) for
all states that were in the union in 1895, to see if there is any town named
Mudville anywhere. Not that if there is it necessrily has anything to do
with the Thayer poem, but I'm willing to be convinced by evidence of course.
In the days before asphalt almost every town was "Mudville", especially at
certain times of the year.

Has anyone tried looking for Lake Wobegon on a map? (No, it isn't Anoka, MN,
even though there's lots of real-life-based material in Keillor's work by
all accounts.) I'd suspect that "Where's the real Mudville?" is possibly the
same kind of wrongly formed onomastic question.

Greg Downing/NYU, at greg.downing[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]nyu.edu or downingg[AT SYMBOL GOES HERE]is2.nyu.edu