Background
Cartwright was born on the 17th of April, 1820 to Alexander Cartwright, Sr., a merchant sea captain, and Esther Rebecca Burlock Cartwright. Alexander Jr. had six siblings.
Cartwright was born on the 17th of April, 1820 to Alexander Cartwright, Sr., a merchant sea captain, and Esther Rebecca Burlock Cartwright. Alexander Jr. had six siblings.
A surveyor by profession, Cartwright was one of the founders of the Knickerbocker Base Ball Club, an organization of amateur players in New York City. He was chairman of a club committee that prepared a set of baseball rules, which were adopted in September 1845 and apparently were first used in a game between the Knickerbockers and the New York Nine at Hoboken, N.J., June 19, 1846.
Alexander Cartwright is the man who should be credited with doing the most to invent the modern game of baseball. In 1845, Cartwright laid out the key rules of the game, including the dimensions of the field. He was enshrined in the National Baseball Hall of Fame even as baseball's establishment propagated a myth that Civil War General Abner Doubleday invented baseball.
Alexander Joy Cartwright was married to Eliza Van Wie.
