About the author
Baseball Novelist and Historian
JB Manheim
JB Manheim is Professor Emeritus at The George Washington University, where he developed the world's first degree-granting program in political communication and was later founding director of the School of Media & Public Affairs. A past chair of the Political Communication Section of the American Political Science Association, In 1995 he was named Professor of the Year for the District of Columbia.
He learned his love of baseball playing catch with his dad in the back yard, collecting splinters in Little League, listening to Dizzy Dean sing "Wabash Cannonball" on the Game of the Week, and huddling with his grandfather for warmth on July nights at The Mistake By The Lake, AKA, Cleveland Municipal Stadium, and renewed it when the National Pastime finally returned to the Nation's Capital.
Manheim's novels bring to life his expertise in propaganda and strategic communication through his fictional stories of baseball behind the scenes. They will lead you to question whether what you think you know about the history of the game and about the powers who control it is real, or whether it's just a carefully nurtured product of lies, deceptions, misdirections, and propaganda. And his nonfiction shines light of a different kind into the dark and little-known corners of the game's history.
JB Manheim is a member of the Society for American Baseball Research, the Internet Baseball Writers Association of America, and International Thriller Writers.
“I've made up stuff that's turned out to be real, that's the spooky part. ”
Tom Clancy
2024 Appearances
I have spent some time on the road this year talking baseball and books. A highlight was Edison Day at the eponymous national park in West Orange, New Jersey, where I had a chance to talk with 650 visitors to a first-time display of the baseball cards in Ted's wallet and other sports items from the park's archive.
B&N - Easton, PA
Babe Ruth Birthplace & Museum - Baltimore
Archivist Leonard DeGraaf, Publisher Lawrence Knorr, and the Author at the Thomas Edison National Historical Park - West Orange
Further Musings by the Author
If you are in the Cooperstown area, drop in on the Hall of Fame Annual Conference on Baseball and American Culture at the end of May 2025. I will be doing a short talk about the origins of the annual Congressional Baseball Game.
I am looking forward to talking about my soon-to-be-published book on the history of the first congressional baseball game, The House Divided, on the May 3 edition of SABR's "Talkin' Baseball." Hope to see you there!
Watch for my review of Jeffrey Orens' interesting book, Selling Baseball, which will appear in the May issue of Outside the Lines.
I had a chance to revisit a sweet little 2015 book, Kris Rutherford's The Galveston Buccaneers. You will find my review, "The Year Baseball Galvanized Galveston," in the March 4 edition of the IBWAA newsletter, Here's the Pitch.
Read my short take on the fascinating politics behind the very first Congressional Baseball Game, "Settling the Score," in the February issue of The Inside Game.
I had a chance to talk about writing The Deadball Files and about baseball in general in an interview you can find on the February 13, 2025, edition of the Start Spreading the News blog.
Lawrence Knorr and I had the chance to meet via Zoom on February 5, 2025, with SABR's Northeast Cooperative, a group of seven local chapters from New Jersey to Canada to talk about Thomas Edison and baseball. The talk included information about the materials in the archive at the Thomas Edison National Historical Park. Take a listen!
Rice Magazine, the university's alumni publication, published a very nice interview-based feature on The Deadball Files series in its Fall 2024 edition. If you happen to get the print edition, it is on page 54. But easier still, check out the online version of "Curveball: A mystery series takes a swing at baseball scandals, real and imagined."
See my article, "The Games of August: The 1914 Edison Baseball Club," in the August 2024 issue of the quarterly magazine of the SABR Deadball Era Committee, The Inside Game. It reports on a unique and previously unknown file of correspondence and other documents showing the day-to-day operations of a semi-pro industrial baseball team during the Deadball years, the Edison Baseball Club of Orange, New Jersey.
Watch as Lawrence Knorr and I discuss how we came to write What's in Ted's Wallet? with members of the Baltimore Babe Ruth Chapter of SABR's "Baseball Babble" on September 8, 2024.
Catch up on my discussion of the whole Deadball Files series with host Dan Levine on the June 11, 2024, edition of SABR Deadball Era Book Talks.
Listen to my discussion with co-author and publisher Lawrence Knorr about our discovery of Ted Edison's collection of T206 baseball cards and our book about the cards, "'What's in Ted's Wallet?' Author JB Manheim on the Sunbury Press Books Show!," May 25, 2024.
I was happy to participate in "Episode 1: Where Are Your From?," the inaugural program of Hometown History NJ, a new podcast about the history of Mendham, NJ, to talk with Ryan Ross and Katie Feather about local hero Abner Doubleday and my book, Doubleday Doubletake.
Read my April 17, 2024, post, "A Newly Revealed Collection of T206s," and a May 12, 2024, followup, "More on Theodore Edison's T206 Collection," on the blog of the Society for American Baseball Research's Baseball Cards Research Committee.
Read my detailed Q&A with Tom Hofarth in the March 22, 2024, edition of his book review blog, The Drill.
Listen to my interview on John Frenaye's December 16, 2023, Eye on Annapolis podcast here.
The Cooperstown Trilogy has become a series, The Deadball Files, and moved to a new publisher. Listen to my conversation with Lawrence Knorr, CEO of Sunbury Press, "J.B. Manheim Brings "The Deadball Files" to the Sunbury Press Books Show," May 19, 2023, and learn about plans that have already (in September 2023) produced classy new covers and a new book, The Federal Case.
My review of Loserville by Clayton Trutor appeared in the November 2022 issue of Outside the Lines, the newsletter of the Business of Baseball Committee of the Society for American Baseball Research.
In April 2022, a promotion at Nationals Park in DC caused a panic on Capitol Hill. Read my thoughts on good promotions and bad baseball, "Nationals Stunt Didn't Threaten National Security," in the May 7, 2022, issue of Here's the Pitch.
Major League Baseball has been on a mission to shorten its games. But what if that's the wrong way to go? What if it is just plain unfair to the fans? Counterintuitive? See my tongue-in-cheek argument, titled "Why MLB Games Should Be Longer, Not Shorter," in the October 9, 2021, issue of Here's the Pitch.
You can find more information about the story behind This Never Happened, the book itself, and how I came to write it in my interview by Paul Semendinger posted on the June 24, 2021, edition of the Start Spreading The News blog.
My take on the restructuring of minor league baseball, titled "That Championship Season," can be found in the June 12, 2021 , issue of Here's the Pitch.
If you are interested in becoming a writer, check out some thoughts about the challenges and rewards of that pursuit in my interview by Stacey Gotsulias on the IBWAA Baseball Writers podcast of June 9, 2021. You can hear the interview starting around minute 39:30.
Read a little more about JT Willett in "A Baseball Writer's Last Big Story" in the May 1, 2021, issue of Here's The Pitch, the newsletter of the Internet Baseball Writers Association of America.
Rice Magazine, the university's alumni publication, published a very nice interview-based feature on The Deadball Files series in its Fall 2024 edition. If you happen to get the print edition, it is on page 54. But easier still, check out the online version of "Curveball: A mystery series takes a swing at baseball scandals, real and imagined."
See my article, "The Games of August: The 1914 Edison Baseball Club," in the August 2024 issue of the quarterly magazine of the SABR Deadball Era Committee, The Inside Game. It reports on a unique and previously unknown file of correspondence and other documents showing the day-to-day operations of a semi-pro industrial baseball team during the Deadball years, the Edison Baseball Club of Orange, New Jersey.
Watch as Lawrence Knorr and I discuss how we came to write What's in Ted's Wallet? with members of the Baltimore Babe Ruth Chapter of SABR's "Baseball Babble" on September 8, 2024.
Catch up on my discussion of the whole Deadball Files series with host Dan Levine on the June 11, 2024, edition of SABR Deadball Era Book Talks.
Listen to my discussion with co-author and publisher Lawrence Knorr about our discovery of Ted Edison's collection of T206 baseball cards and our book about the cards, "'What's in Ted's Wallet?' Author JB Manheim on the Sunbury Press Books Show!," May 25, 2024.
I was happy to participate in "Episode 1: Where Are Your From?," the inaugural program of Hometown History NJ, a new podcast about the history of Mendham, NJ, to talk with Ryan Ross and Katie Feather about local hero Abner Doubleday and my book, Doubleday Doubletake.
Read my April 17, 2024, post, "A Newly Revealed Collection of T206s," and a May 12, 2024, followup, "More on Theodore Edison's T206 Collection," on the blog of the Society for American Baseball Research's Baseball Cards Research Committee.
Read my detailed Q&A with Tom Hofarth in the March 22, 2024, edition of his book review blog, The Drill.
Listen to my interview on John Frenaye's December 16, 2023, Eye on Annapolis podcast here.
The Cooperstown Trilogy has become a series, The Deadball Files, and moved to a new publisher. Listen to my conversation with Lawrence Knorr, CEO of Sunbury Press, "J.B. Manheim Brings "The Deadball Files" to the Sunbury Press Books Show," May 19, 2023, and learn about plans that have already (in September 2023) produced classy new covers and a new book, The Federal Case.
My review of Loserville by Clayton Trutor appeared in the November 2022 issue of Outside the Lines, the newsletter of the Business of Baseball Committee of the Society for American Baseball Research.
In April 2022, a promotion at Nationals Park in DC caused a panic on Capitol Hill. Read my thoughts on good promotions and bad baseball, "Nationals Stunt Didn't Threaten National Security," in the May 7, 2022, issue of Here's the Pitch.
Major League Baseball has been on a mission to shorten its games. But what if that's the wrong way to go? What if it is just plain unfair to the fans? Counterintuitive? See my tongue-in-cheek argument, titled "Why MLB Games Should Be Longer, Not Shorter," in the October 9, 2021, issue of Here's the Pitch.
You can find more information about the story behind This Never Happened, the book itself, and how I came to write it in my interview by Paul Semendinger posted on the June 24, 2021, edition of the Start Spreading The News blog.
My take on the restructuring of minor league baseball, titled "That Championship Season," can be found in the June 12, 2021 , issue of Here's the Pitch.
If you are interested in becoming a writer, check out some thoughts about the challenges and rewards of that pursuit in my interview by Stacey Gotsulias on the IBWAA Baseball Writers podcast of June 9, 2021. You can hear the interview starting around minute 39:30.
Read a little more about JT Willett in "A Baseball Writer's Last Big Story" in the May 1, 2021, issue of Here's The Pitch, the newsletter of the Internet Baseball Writers Association of America.
Some Books and Movies I recommend
General Mysteries:
The series of Joe Leaphorn and Jim Chee adventures by Tony Hillerman. Every one of them.
Baseball Fiction:
Darryl Brock, If I Never Get Back
Eric Rolfe Greenberg, The Celebrant
W.P. Kinsella, Shoeless Joe (if I had to pick just one by Kinsella)
Floyd Sullivan, Called Out
Baseball in the Deadball Era:
Charles Fountain, The Betrayal
Mark S. Halfon, Tales from the Deadball Era
Jim Leeke, From the Dugouts to the Trenches
Daniel R. Levitt, The Battle That Forged Modern Baseball
Lawrence S. Ritter, The Glory of Their Times
Philip Seib, The Player
Mike Vaccaro, The First Fall Classic
Robert Peyton Wiggins, The Federal League of Base Ball Clubs
General Baseball Nonfiction:
J.C. Bradbury, The Baseball Economist
John Feinstein, Where Nobody Knows Your Name
Jane Leavy, The Big Fella
Michael Lewis, Moneyball
John Pessah, The Game
Ron Shelton, The Church of Baseball
John Thorn, Baseball in the Garden of Eden
Edmund F. Wehrle, Breaking Babe Ruth
Ten Favorite Baseball Movies (Plus One) in Alphabetical Order:
Bang the Drum Slowly (for the primer on Major League Tegwar)
Bull Durham (an original - read the related book above by Ron Shelton)
Field of Dreams (inspired by Kinsella's book above)
For Love of the Game (way better than the book by Michael Shaara)
A League of Their Own (corny and historic all in one)
Major League (art predicting life, at least in Cleveland; don't steal home without it)
Million Dollar Arm (beating the odds)
Moneyball (based on Lewis's book above)
The Natural (more satisfying than the book by Bernard Malamud)
The Rookie (because every list needs one of these feel gooders)
The Scout (if only for the ballpark fare and the greatest single sentence in the entire genre)