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Sports in the early west was not always a pretty sport.  Among the baseball games at picnics, and the college football games, and the high school basketball games, there were games, that in their day were not illegal as they are today. 
        Rooster pits were popular among the Comstock Lode.  And it wasn't always the tough, and rugged men of the camps. It was men like William Sharon, of the Bank of California, along with his wealthy associates that had a taste for blood that kept the roosters for fighting and wagering.
        Dogfights were also common, but men like Sharon preferred to pit bulldogs against wildcats.  These type of fights were much more popular along the Comstock than elsewhere. 
        Baseball, boxing and a horseracing track offered considerable variety to sports fans, as well as trap-shooting, broom ball, and auto racing in the desert.

These players played because they loved the sport, not for the "payoff"

 Ruth Baseball Team 1908.  A summer baseball league had been
organized in White Pine County.  Each company town had its own team -
Ruth, Copper Flat, Ely, McGill and one representing the Nevada Northern RR.
Teams were sponsored by the copper companies, who bought uniforms
and donated land for the baseball diamond.
 


 Tonapah High School  1916  Girls Basketball Team

 


 Tonapah  v. Goldfield  at Tonapah, August 22, 1909
Each town had its own baseball team, and there were also teams representing
fraternal organizations.  Teams usually played against neighboring teams,
although on occasion a team would board a train and play a game in some
more distant town. 
 



 Members of the Fallon Baseball Team 1911 at Lovelock for a league game.
 


 The Manhattan Baseball Team 1912.  Note the letter "M" in the diamond
design on the jerseys, and a portion of "Manhattan" on the jersey of the man
 in the white uniform, kneeling in the front row.  The man kneeling in the front,
not in uniform may be the team mascot, or someone who insisted on being in the photo.
The two men standing, also not in uniform, are most likely the coach and the manager.

 


 The Eureka Baseball Team poses for a photo boarding a Eureka and Palisade
train for a baseball game, circa 1912.
 


 Moapa Valley Baseball Team Circa unknown


 Tonapah Championship Basketball Team  1925

Wrestling

Left to Right: Leo Papionis - Greek wrestler from Los Angeles
  Ira Dean -World Light heavyweight & grappling champion
  George Batalis - Las Vegas wrestler - preparing for a world championship match at the El Patio open air theater in Las Vegas, 23 May 1929.



Wrestling in Las Vegas 1929-30

Boxing

Fist fighting was a popular sport in the camps, it was a brutal event.  It was out and out bare fisted fighting.  That is until the first legislature of the Territory of Nevada of which Virginia City was in, made it unlawful for persons to fight "to the terror of the citizens of the Territory".  Sometime later boxing was legalized as long as gloves were used.


Jeffries vs. Johnson - Reno
Jeffries retired undefeated in 1904 to his alfalfa farm in southern California.
He had not fought in six years.  He was elected by the press and the public as
the "White Hope", the only man who might beat Jack Johnson.  Jeffries was older and past his prime.  Johnson was at his peak.  In the fifteenth round Jeffries was knocked down, barely rose before the count was over, and his seconds threw in the sponge.  It was a match that made boxing history.


There'll be more to come on sports, especially boxing