Perspective

St. Louis, it seems, is wild with joy over the fact that she has at last got the best of Chicago.  She has been able to hire nine better ball players than Chicago, and by that means has been enabled to donate to Chicago nine very nice goose-eggs.  Chicago can afford to grant her neighbor that slight satisfaction; for while St. Louisans were shouting themselves hoarse over a game of ball, Chicago merchants were selling hundreds of thousands of dollars worth of goods at St. Louis' door.

-Mears Baseball Scrapbook, Volume 4, 1856-1907


This originally appeared in the Chicago Times on May 8, 1875, and obviously was a reaction to the Brown Stockings victory over the White Stockings.  While it's all sour grapes, they make a valid point about Chicago's burgeoning economic dominance of the Midwest.