Yokohama Country & Athletic Club

Yokohama Country & Athletic Club
Formation 1868 (1868)
Location
Coordinates 35°25′27″N 139°38′57″E / 35.424099°N 139.649286°E / 35.424099; 139.649286Coordinates: 35°25′27″N 139°38′57″E / 35.424099°N 139.649286°E / 35.424099; 139.649286
Website www.ycac.or.jp

The Yokohama Country & Athletic Club, is a sport and recreational club located in Yamate, Yokohama.

First founded in 1868 by Scottish cricketer James Pender Mollison (21 July 1844 - 22 November 1931) as the Yokohama Cricket Club. In 1884 members voted to absorb the Yokohama Foot Ball Club (Rugby Union), Athletics, Baseball and Tennis clubs to form the Yokohama Country & Athletic Club (YC&AC) as it is now known.[1]

Sporting History

Cricket

Although the first recorded cricket match in Japan was played in Yokohama on June 25th 1863 between a Royal Navy team and members of the local merchant community,[2][3] the Yokohama Cricket Club was one of Japan's first organized cricket teams and was the center of many recreational and sporting facilities for English merchants living in Yokohama. The club's first facilities were at a location known as the Swamp Ground, but in 1870 the club moved to a larger 120 acre plot and played matches in a location that now hosts the Yokohama Stadium.[4]

Baseball

By the 1880's sufficient numbers of American's had joined the club for baseball to supplant cricket in terms of popularity.[5][6] Prior to the 1890's the club upheld restrictive membership policies that excluded the use of the club's facilities to Japanese nationals. Resentment of these rules and the extraterritoriality enjoyed by foreign nationals in the treaty ports prompted a formal challenge in 1891 by a team from Ichikō, the elite University of Tokyo preparatory school.[7] After five years of prevarication and delay, on the 29 May 1896 a historic match took place where the amateur YC&AC club side was convincingly beaten 29 - 4. A hurriedly arranged rematch on June 5, led to further humiliation for the club, with a loss of 32 - 9 to the less experienced Japanese high school team.[8] After one further defeat of 22 - 6, players from the visiting US Navy ship USS Olympia were drafted to assist, and a narrow consolation victory for the club of 14 - 12 was achieved.[9]

As one of the first truly international baseball matches to be played in Japan, where a local team 'beat the foreigners at their own game', the Ichikō high school team was lauded in the contemporary press as national heroes. News of this victory greatly contributed to the popularity of baseball as a school sport in Japan.[10]

Rugby Union

The club's rugby activities include the Gareth MacFadyen Cup, a perpetual local derby-style memorial rugby union match contested on an annual basis since 2001 in Tokyo between the Tokyo Crusaders and the Yokohama Country and Athletic Club.

Current Facilities

In 1910 the club vacated its facilities in downtown Yokohama and relocated to an elevated site at Yaguchidai close to the current Yamate Station on the JR East Negishi Line. Current facilities provide for a wide variety of indoor and outdoor sports including tennis, rugby, cricket, football, squash, swimming and basketball.[11]

References

  1. ↑ "Yokohama Country and Athletic Club". YC&AC. Retrieved 1 April 2016.
  2. ↑ Galbraith, Michael (16 June 2013). "Death threats sparked Japan's first cricket game". Japan Times. Retrieved 1 April 2016.
  3. ↑ "Howzat!". Kansai Scene. Retrieved 2009-10-11.
  4. ↑ Galbraith, Mike. "A History of the Yokohama Country & Athletic Club". Yokoham Country & Athletic Club Website. YC&AC.
  5. ↑ Murphy, Kevin (2003). The American Merchant Experience in Nineteenth Century Japan. London: RoutledgeCurzon. p. 80. ISBN 0-415-29683-8.
  6. ↑ Dreifort, John, ed. (2001). Baseball History from Outside the Lines: A Reader. University of Nebraska Press. p. 289. ISBN 0-8032-6587-5.
  7. ↑ Reiss, Steven (2013). Sport in Industrial America, 1850-1920. Oxford: Wiley-Blackwell. p. Chapter 6. ISBN 978-1-118-53771-8.
  8. ↑ Dreifort, John, ed. (2001). Baseball History from Outside the Lines: A Reader. University of Nebraska Press. p. 292. ISBN 0-8032-6587-5.
  9. ↑ Guttmann, Allen (2001). Japanese Sports: A History. Honolulu: University of Hawaii Press. p. 86. ISBN 0-8248-2414-8.
  10. ↑ Dunning, Eric (2004). Sport Histories: Figurational Studies in the Development of Modern Sports. London: Routledge. p. 163. ISBN 0-415-28665-4.
  11. ↑ Article about Japanese cricket Archived June 19, 2009, at the Wayback Machine.


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