The Business of Baseball

 V.  Enrichment & Assessment Activities

 A.     If a middle class family attended the World Series during the era they were assigned to research, what percentage of the family’s weekly wage would be spent on the tickets?  If the family bought hot dogs and sodas at that game, what is the total amount the family would have spent?  What percentage of the family’s weekly wage would that represent?

B.     Apply the law of supply and demand to current event situations, such as natural disasters or wars, which might impact costs associated with materials, energy, labor or transportation.

C.     Students can create a proposal to produce a new product.  In the business plan, they should provide a production budget that accounts for materials, energy, labor and transportation.

D.     From data gathered during this lesson, students should create tables, graphs or pie charts to visually illustrate what they have learned.  Working in groups, students should develop questions that can be answered by data found in the graphs they created.  Students could then trade their graphs and questions with each other.

E.      Ask students to examine the “Green Light Letter” from President Franklin D. Roosevelt to Baseball Commissioner Kenesaw M. Landis urging the continuation of baseball at the outset of World War II.  Discuss the economic implications and benefits of Roosevelt’s recommendation.  Use this artifact (found at baseballhalloffame.org) as a writing or discussion prompt for measuring students’ ability to interpret a primary source document with an understanding of economic and historical impact.

Pat LaFond
Education Director
National Baseball Hall of Fame
607.547.0362
25 Main Street
PO Box 590
Cooperstown, New York  13326
plafond@baseballhalloffame.org