#petersfield

2 incidents tagged

Old John Small Dies — The Last of the Hambledon Men, 1826

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1826-12-31

John Small the elder, Hampshire batsman of the great Hambledon era and inventor of the straight bat, died at Petersfield in 1826 at the age of 89. With his death the last of the original Hambledon Men was gone, severing the living link between modern Lord's-centred cricket and the village game that had dominated the eighteenth century.

#john-small#hambledon#1826

⭐Mild

Introduction of the Shouldered Cricket Bat — Petersfield Workshop, 1815

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1815-04-01

Around 1815 the Petersfield bat-maker William Small — son of the Hambledon professional John Small Senior — began producing cricket bats with a recognisable 'shoulder', tapering from a thicker blade up to a narrower handle. The design replaced the curved, club-like underarm bat that had been standard since the eighteenth century and is the immediate ancestor of the modern cricket bat shape.

#regency-cricket#underarm#cricket-bat