Porter's Spirit of the Times was a general sporting and theatrical weekly, but is best remembered today for its role in recording a critical period during baseball's amateur era. The National Association of Base Ball Players was the first baseball organization to extend beyond a single club, and its birth coincides neatly with the first volume of Porter's. The first hint comes in Volume 1, issue #7 (11 October 1856): "It is said that a Convention of all the Base Ball Clubs of this city and suburbs will be held this fall, for the purpose of considering whether any and what amendments to the rules and laws governing this game should be made." A baseball column on 6 December 1856 includes the complete rules as they were generally accepted at that time, including a diagram of the field, plus a player-by-player review of the pioneering Knickerbocker club. The first baseball convention was reported at length on 31 January 1857, with a patriotic flourish: "Base Ball . . . ought to be looked upon in this country with the same national enthusiasm as Cricket and Foot Ball are regarded in the British Islands. . . . There should be some one game peculiar to the citizens of the United States." This organization can be considered the birth of organized league baseball in America. "An important repository of early baseball, including . . . the publication of the first set of rules"--Lomazow 639 and BB1. "In this, the first early heyday of the game, Porter's set such a high standard for baseball coverage that even the legendary Clipper could not, at first, keep up"--Block, Baseball Before We Knew It, page 226. with--much of the gap filled with a run of the very similarly named rival publication, Spirit of the Times: A Chronicle of the Turf, Agriculture, Field Sports, Literature and the Stage. Volume XXVII (51 issues, lacking only issue #46); similarly disbound, issue #1 and index defective, general dampstaining. New York, 14 February 1857 to 6 February 1858 and the colored premium equestrian engraving issued by Porter's in 1858 titled "Flora Temple."