y the season of 1883, the two existing major leagues, the National League and the American Association, had formed a partnership that had given them total control over the game.  At the time, the Reserve Clause bound players to their teams for as long as the team wanted.  Free agency lay almost a hundred years in the future, and the team owners looked forward to a time of absolute control.  A St Louis businessman, Henry Lucas, at the young age of 26, threw a wrench into the works by formeing a new league, the Union Association, that would not make slaves of the players. 
    Although events would soon demonstrate Lucas had other motives, the league was quickly assembled in the winter of 1883.
    The seven charter teams were: 
  Baltimore Unions
  Boston Reds
  Chicago Browns
  Cincinnati Outlaw Reds
  Philadelphia Keystones
  St Louis Maroons
  Washington Nationals
Seven teams make an awkward league, and the Altoona Mountain Citys were invited to be the eighth team.  The two established leagues moved quickly to meet the Unionist threat.  The American Association expanded by four teams to try to keep them out of the Unionist camp, but to no avail.
    The Union Association seemed doomed from the start.  St Louis ran away with the pennant race, finishing 35.5 games ahead of the second place Milwaukee Brewers, who entered the league in its closing days from the Northwestern League to replace the Pittsburgh Stogies, who had already moved from Chicago.  Other teams dropping out along the way were the Mountain Citys, replaced by the Kansas City Cowboys; the Keystones, who were replaced first by the Wilmington Quicksteps, who folded to make way for the St. Paul White Caps.  Alternate names for teams include the Milwaukee Grays, and the generic name Unions, used by several clubs.
  The Association tried to organize for the 1885 season, but few teams showed up.  Henry Lucas' St Louis Maroons moved to the National League, perhaps his true intention all along.  The Maroons finished the 1885 season dead last, 49 games behind the Chicago White Stockings.  The Maroons' last season was 1886; they fin