Geography Baseball at Sears School

While casting around for subjects to write about some time back I thought that I would write about a game that we played in Jr. High, Geography Baseball. I did the obligatory Google Search and was surprised to find that Geographybaseball.com exists and further that the proprietor of the site claims to have “invented” the game and has trademarked the name. I was a little shocked by that because the man who “invented” the game of Geography Baseball has been dead for some time now. The bio of the alleged “inventor” of the game,” Robert A. Pierce says that he started his teaching career in 1969. The Social Studies teacher I had during both seventh and eighth grade was the late Robert Karp and we played Geography Baseball during the ’71-‘72 and ’72-‘73 school years. Mr. Karp had been playing the game with his students at Joseph Sears School for over a decade by the time I came along. While searching for anything concerning Mr. Karp on the web I found that my Sears School classmate Rep. Mark Kirk (R-IL) (here’s Mark’s blog) had submitted Mr. Karp’s name as his most memorable teacher for the National Educational Association’s National Teacher Day last May. Mark’s quote is great:

"Mr. Karp invented 'Geography Baseball' and turned it into a right of passage in our town. We memorized the locations of Georgia (then in the Soviet Union), Goa (in India) and the Gobi desert (in China). It sparked an interest to see each of these places and to understand America's role in the world. I have seen each one and am now working to expand language and exchange opportunities for all American students. Mr. Karp has passed away, but I carried his legacy as a nursery school assistant, middle school teacher, and now as a congressman."

I’m glad that Mark got Mr. Karp’s name out onto the internet as the inventor of the game although it is probably something that Mr. Karp would not have taken credit for. Anyways, here is how we played the game Geography Baseball At Joseph Sears School starting sometime in the late 1950s or early 1960s.

The game was played on Fridays in Mr. Karp’s classroom, the classroom contained large pull-down maps on three walls; all of the maps were pulled down on game day, after school and during lunch time for studying. Each class was divided into two evenly matched teams and each class was given two lists of geographical points (city, town, mountain, river…) and as the season progressed different classes got differing lists each week. The first list was for “Singles”, an obvious play on the “baseball” theme of the game and consisted of 50 relatively easy places to find on one of the maps. The second list contained 50 spots representing “Doubles”, another transparent riff on Major League Baseball and those were more difficult places. Both lists got more difficult during the two years that we played the game, some “Doubles” migrated to the “Singles” lists but both required study each week.

When the game started each team divided into sides of the classroom and sat according to the “order” that the week’s “manager” had written on their “scorecard” and turned in to the “Umpire”, “Commissioner” and all around Grand Poobah, Mr. Karp. It is worth noting that the randomness of baseball was introduced into the game by Mr. Karp through his “on the field rulings” that were often arbitrary; for instance one could be called out for touching the map too hard or by not touching the map and both were potentially arbitrary. Just like in the game of baseball the rulings sometimes stole a line smash.
To begin the game the “visitor” team would send their first “batter” to “the plate” by having that student walk up in front of the class and behind Mr. Karp’s desk. When the student was in the “batters box” Mr. Karp would ask a question from the singles list and the student had a limited amount of time to walk over to a map and point at the place in question. Another bit of randomness was that the better students had much less time on the easy ones. At that point the “batter” has a choice of taking “first base” or going back up to “the plate” to try their hand at the “doubles” list. The same rules applied to the doubles questions except that “rulings on the field” were likely to be even more stringent. I think that the player is out if the “doubles” attempt is a failure. If the “batter” is successful at “the plate” again the student has another choice of taking second or attempting a “triple”. A “triple” could be attained by standing in front of the classroom and accurately reciting a report on a current event without verbally stumbling. The “Homerun” consisted of bizarrely out of the way spots that were both obscure and difficult to find on a map, these “homeruns” came from a “secret list”, parts of which were occasionally “left” on Mr. Karp’s desk so that we could see what we were up against. Naturally the normal rules of baseball applied as far as advancing runners, scoring runs, outs per side and the number of “innings”.

Mark was correct to describe Geography Baseball was a right of passage in our town and frankly a pretty good one. The game made the rather dull task of memorizing geographic locales and turned it into a game that also included socializing as part of the studying process (all of us had an atlas but none of us had pull-down maps at home) and even included some public speaking. The game was eventually discontinued at Joseph Sears due to the complaints of some vocal parents that their children were spending too much time preparing for geography. Years later many of us learned that Mr. Karp had been a fighter pilot in the Pacific during World War II, that tidbit explained why we all had to know the name of damn near every island and atoll in that ocean. Flying Debris referred to Mr. Robert Karp here.

As to the gentleman who has trademarked the game I must ask you to take care of the game that so many of us played years ago, it is a great game and motivator.

Thanks to Dr. Sanity and her Carnival of Insanities for linking to this post about a great learning game.