Adrian Constantine Anson

A Ball Player's Career Adrian Constantine Anson

Adrian Constantine Anson (1852-1922), known by the nicknames "Cap" and "Pop", was a professional baseball player in the National Association and Major League Baseball. He played in a record twenty-seven consecutive seasons and was regarded as one of the greatest players of his era. His contemporary influence and prestige are regarded by historians as playing a major role in establishing the racial segregation in major league baseball that persisted until the late 1940s. Beginning in 1866, he spent two years at the high-school age boarding school of the University of Notre Dame after being sent there by his father in hopes of curtailing his mischievousness. His time away did little to discipline him, and soon after he returned home his father sent him to the University of Iowa. He played on a number of competitive baseball clubs in his youth and began to play professionally in the National Association (NA) at the age of 19. His best years in the NA were 1872 and 1873, when he finished in the top 5. He wrote A Ball Player's Career (1900).