An audience with the President

WASHINGTON, D.C. - The first "base ball club" to visit the White House did so on this date in 1865. The Atlantics, a dynasty of the 1860's, had an audience with President Andrew Johnson, just four months after Abraham Lincoln was assassinated. The Atlantics were escorted to the White House by an organization called the National Base Ball Club.

According to wikipedia.org, the Atlantics came by way of Brooklyn, New York. The team was organized in 1855. It was considered the champions of base ball through most of the 1860's, reportedly going 18-0 in 1865, thus the White House visit. Back then, baseball was run more like boxing in that if you defeated the champion, you became the champion, no matter what your record was.

CONTRIBUTING SOURCES:
New York Tribune, Washington, D.C., August 31, 1865

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