Albert Goodwill Spalding, the son of a Byron, Illinois farmer, is regarded as the “organizational genius of baseball's pioneer days” and the game's first great pitcher.

In 1865, he began playing competitively on a youth team, the Rockford Pioneers. After another two years of amateur play, he turned down offers from professional ball clubs in Washington, Cleveland, and New York to get business experience (at his mothers request.) After working for various companies, he returned to baseball when he was hired to play professionally.

Albert Spalding was a pitcher for the Boston Red Stockings (later the Boston Red Sox) and the Chicago White Stockings (becoming the Chicago Cubs in 1903) from 1871-1878. With a win-loss record of 252-65, Spalding won the pennant six seasons in a row, and for each of those seasons was his team's only pitcher. Later, Spalding would become president and part-owner of the White Stockings from 1882-1902.

Retired from the game in 1876, Spalding and his brother, J. Walter Spalding, obtained the right to produce the official National League baseball, which they would continue to produce for the next 100 years. The same year they opened A. G. Spalding & Bros., the Chicago sporting goods store.

Spalding also makes the first Major League Baseball glove in 1887. Throughout its' history, dozens of Hall of Fame players have worn Spalding fielding gloves.

And, when Dr. James Naismith invented the game of basketball in 1891, he asked Spalding to develop the first basketball to replace the soccer balls that were being used at the time. Soon, official rules of the game read, "the ball made by A.G. Spalding & Bros. shall be the official ball."