(Special thanks to the University Archives and to former Georgetown faculty member, R. Emmett Curran, A History of Georgetown University, Volumes 1-3)
LET US BEGIN... 
Georgetown founder, John Carroll, could not have envisioned in 1789 the rise of intercollegiate sports one hundred years hence. His original plans did however prohibit any “playing” on Sundays. By the early 1800’s, outdoor sport activities were commonplace.
The first athletic facility built on the Georgetown campus was a handball court in 1814 on what is now Healy lawn, at a cost of $800. Handball was played year-round by students and faculty alike. Swimming in the Potomac and ice-skating on a campus pond were also popular pastimes.
By 1830, students were playing an early recreational version of soccer or rugby. In the years leading up to the Civil War, additional outdoor handball courts were constructed as well as a wooden gymnasium, featuring parallel bars, rings, and other apparatus for workouts. These activities continued after the war with individual recreational sports of cycling, billiards, and boxing also gaining currency. In the mid-1870’s, a wooden building was constructed, housing a rowing machine, gymnastic equipment, weights, and a dressing room. In addition, an intramural athletic sports festival was initiated and continued annually over the next decade.
In the 1850’s, an early version of recreational baseball was being played on campus. Team sports did not really emerge on the Georgetown campus until after the Civil War. Baseball, popular in the troop encampments of the northern and southern armies, spread rapidly to college campuses.
By 1869, the College boasted two intramural baseball clubs, the Stonewalls and the Quicksteps in addition to four class-based teams. In the following years, a select team was chosen from among the two teams to form the College Nine, which would then compete against neighboring institutions. Games were initially played on the field on which Lauinger Library would later be built (shown here), and eventually on Varsity Field, now Copley lawn.
A story in The Hoya in 1920 refers to the first intercollegiate baseball game taking place in 1866. However, no official record of such a contest exists.
On May 10, 1870, the College Nine played Georgetown’s first officially recorded game against an intercollegiate opponent, falling 23-17 in an away contest to Columbian College (now George Washington University). Six such games (three home and three away) were played between the two schools in the spring and fall that year, with Georgetown prevailing in four of the contests and retiring a gilded ball trophy.
Origins are never as clear and crisp as we would like them to be. So too with our baseball team and Georgetown Athletics. Our beginnings were decidedly humble.
With a small undergraduate population of approximately 140 students, it began as a wholly student-driven enterprise. Both the Quicksteps and the Stonewalls soon began to aggressively recruit
entering students to their side upon their matriculation at the College. At the time, there was no athletic department or administrative funding to support a team, nor was there an existing governing body like the NCAA. In the 1870’s, a single Jesuit oversaw all student activities, eligibility was a matter of enrollment, and rudimentary rules of play were still evolving. The fervor of student interest however, quickly led the Jesuit prelates to advertise Georgetown athletics facilities and support (moral, not financial) of organized sports teams in the College catalogue.
The 1875 intercollegiate team (shown in the photo below) consisted of just nine players. School colors were not established until 1876 when members of the Crew chose blue and gray to help fans identify their racing shells from the shore. The first uniforms worn by any Georgetown team were donned by the baseball team in 1885.
By the end of its second decade, with student enthusiasm for the game somewhat diminished and football newly established on the Hilltop, Georgetown baseball had progressed to more and better equipment, standardization of rules, and a diverse fall and spring schedule that included more area colleges, semi-pro teams, and a few high schools.
COMING NEXT: Baseball Rises to National Prominence
