April 29: Breaking Records, Breaking Barriers

Games People Don’t Play
Writer: BILL O’DRISCOLL

There’s a nice paradox in the juxtaposition, one that says something about the weird role sports has come to play in America. The antique leather ball, hand-stitched and small as an infant’s fist, rests near the sleek synthetics of a modern football uniform draped over a mannequin. But if the first displays you see at Sports: Breaking Records, Breaking Barriers -- Abraham Lincoln’s handball and the threads Terry Bradshaw wore to his final Super Bowl -- span some six-score years, they mark a cultural distance perhaps even greater.

The two glass cases are among three dozen teamed up in Sports, a Smithsonian Institution road show making its national premiere at the Western Pennsylvania Sports Museum. Like its cousin the arts, sport perpetually walks the line between “just for fun” and deadly serious; it’s an amusement that’s alternately blamed and credited for our moral fiber.
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Sports: Breaking Records, Breaking Barriers continues through May 31. Western Pennsylvania Sports Museum, Heinz History Center, 1212 Smallman St., Strip District. 412-454-6000.