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Ham Avery

Charles Hammond Avery (April 8, 1854 – January 3, 1927) was an American lawyer, in his youth a college baseball pitcher, and a professional baseball umpire. Avery, son of Charles L'Hommedieu Avery and Martha (Bakewell) Avery, was a prep school student in Cincinnati in 1870; the next year he enrolled at Yale, where he joined the baseball team in the spring of his sophomore year in 1873. He was called (by Frank Blair) "the first man to pitch a curve-ball game", using the new pitch with success against Harvard. When he graduated in 1875, he was offered the very large salary of $3,400 by Harry Wright to pitch for the Boston Red Stockings, an offer matched by the Hartford Dark Blues, but "Avery, a Skull & Bones Society blueblood, thought professional baseball beneath him, and demurred." He went on to study at the Cincinnati Law School and in the office of Judge Alphonso Taft and was admitted to the Cincinnati bar in 1878, where he had a successful legal practice, representing "various well-known corporations." He married Nettie Barker in 1882; she died the following year, and in 1890 he married Alice Aiken, with whom he had a daughter and a son. Avery umpired 9 total National Association games in and . all of them as the home plate umpire.

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Article summary

Charles Hammond Avery (April 8, 1854 – January 3, 1927) was an American lawyer, in his youth a college baseball pitcher, and a professional baseball umpire. Avery, son of Charles L'Hommedieu Avery and Martha (Bakewell) Avery, was a prep school student in Cincinnati in 1870; the next year he enrolled at Yale, where he joined the baseball team in the spring of his sophomore year in 1873. He was called (by Frank Blair) "the first man to pitch a curve-ball game", using the new pitch with success against Harvard. When he graduated in 1875, he was offered the very large salary of $3,400 by Harry Wright to pitch for the Boston Red Stockings, an offer matched by the Hartford Dark Blues, but "Avery, a Skull & Bones Society blueblood, thought professional baseball beneath him, and demurred." He went on to study at the Cincinnati Law School and in the office of Judge Alphonso Taft and was admitted to the Cincinnati bar in 1878, where he had a successful legal practice, representing "various well-known corporations." He married Nettie Barker in 1882; she died the following year, and in 1890 he married Alice Aiken, with whom he had a daughter and a son. Avery umpired 9 total National Association games in and . all of them as the home plate umpire.

Key claims

  1. date of death: 1890 — source: Wikipedia · confidence 0.95

Discussion questions

  1. Summarise the article in your own words. Which single claim would you verify first, and why?
  2. The record states that the date of death is "1890". What evidence would count against this claim?
  3. Which claim in this article is most likely to be revised as the sources update? How would you check its current status?
  4. If two sources disagreed about one of these facts, what would you need in order to trust one over the other?

Bibliography

  1. Wikipedia https://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?oldid=1315684314

Key claims and bibliography are generated from the same tracked claims and sources as the article page.