'Laws of Base Ball' documents fetch record $3.2 million at auction

By Marcus E. Howard NEW YORK (Reuters) - A trove of historical documents that shed fresh light on the origins of baseball sold at auction on Sunday for more than $3.2 million, a record auction price for papers related to the sport that became America's "national pastime." The 23 pages of yellowed documents included original notes about the setting of official rules of the then-emerging sport of base ball, which evolved in the 19th century from earlier games using bats and balls. The notes were written by Daniel Lucius "Doc" Adams, president of the New York Knickerbockers Base Ball Club, when 14 clubs convened in New York City in January 1857 to codify rules for the sport, which gradually became known by a single word, baseball. The documents, entitled the "Laws of Base Ball," were expected to sell for about $1 million, said SCP Auctions, the California auction house that conducted the sale.

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