The first baseball gloves were created in the 1870's with the idea to pad and protect the players' hands. Most were designed so the player could knock the ball to the ground and not necessarily catch it. The first players to use baseball gloves were often taunted and teased as being "too soft" or "sissies" because they did not want to catch the ball with their bare hands. This mentality slowed the development of baseball glove design.

History's first baseball gloves were made from pieces of leather sewn together to fit over a player's hand. Many early baseball gloves were simple leather gloves with the fingertips cut off. Workman gloves were readily available and commonly refashioned for use. The growing popularity of the use of baseball gloves opened the door for the retail market, and soon patented designs began to surface, regardless of practicability. 1887 Ball Player Hand Protector.

In the 1880s a rule was passed that made even the most "manly" of players consider using gloves: pitchers were now allowed to throw overhand. With the speed of pitches now greatly increased, balls were being thrown with alarming force to catchers, and struck with much greater force by batters. In 1885, George H. Rawlings was issued a patent for a Padded Baseball Glove. This was the first patent that was specific to baseball. Previous patents with suggested use for "sports" were developed by Spalding and Reach for use on the baseball field.

Rawlings patent featured a padded glove in both fingerless and full fingered models. The gloves with the fingertips cut off, were made to allow for the same control of a bare hand when throwing but with extra padding. "Finger Tip" gloves, with heavy reinforced leather along the tip of the fingers were soon to follow. They were designed to help grip a caught ball from getting away, and add extra protection to the finger tips The padded "Workman" style baseball gloves would be the model used for years to come.

The workman style Crescent Padded Palm or heel ridge gloves would become popular from about 1897 to 1905. A ridge of rolled padding extends in a semicircle from the thumb across the wrist and up towards the pinky finger. The ridge creates a deep pocket to trap the ball. Sometime around 1900 the Crescent gloves were also made available with a full web. The first web using a piece of material sewn directly to the thumb and forefinger. By 1910 the crescent pads are pretty much phased out, showing up occasionally in the teens.

  Earl Harry Decker, a catcher that played Major League baseball from 1887-1890, held a number of patents that are popular with collectors today. The most popular being the 1889 patented "Decker's Safety Mitt," AKA the "Decker Patent." Among the multiple features the mitt featured an extra layer of leather on the back, and edge band on top of the finger stalls for protection of the catchers fingers. Decker sold the patent to A.G. Spalding and this design was used for many decades to come.

 Because Harry was in trouble with the law, his wife Anna Burns Decker submit a patent for him in 1895. The patent was to produce a cheap construction of a glove or mitt, containing a relatively greater catching surface, independent inside padding which can be readily detached and replaced, and full round perimeter banding.

 Harry Decker invented a thumbless design and filed the patent in 1904 while incarcerated at San Quentin. One of the prison guards, George J Stiteley, did the legal paperwork and was credited as a co-inventor. convicted of numerous crimes with most involving forgery, Decker racked up arrests and convictions in at least six states. Victims of his crimes included Al Reach, whose name appeared on forged checks.

  The "King Patent" with the removable lining was patented by Spalding assignee Charles M King on June 28, 1910. The inner lining padding can be removed from the edges of the wrist and back portions of the glove, for adjustment and repair. Advertised as a glove within a glove, it can be easily taken apart and put together again. Just as much or a little padding as the individual may desire can be stitched to the fabric of the inner glove. Extra padding for stitching on was made available at any A.G. Spalding store.

  Spalding introduced the No. 10-0 "World Series" Catchers mitt in 1913. The mitt featured a molded face, patented by assignee Charles M. King. Also made available in the 1913 catalog was the model No. 10-0P catchers mitt that featured an additional King patent. The perforated palm. The object of the perforated palm, patent no. 1,056,909 was "to produce a base ball glove or mitt in which the palm portion is constructed to present a more adherent surface in catching a base ball." Reach issued the 9A Perforated Palm catchers mitt around the same time.

The largest improvement ever in glove design happened in 1920, when Bill Doak, a journeyman pitcher for the St. Louis Cardinals, approached Rawlings with an idea for a web laced between the first finger and thumb. Before Doak's invention, gloves were primarily protective equipment that kept fielders' hands and fingers from being hurt by hard hit balls. Bill Doak developed the idea of putting a substantial webbing between the glove's thumb and first finger to form a substantial pre-formed pocket in which to catch the ball.

 The Rawlings "Bill Doak" model that was first introduced in 1922 was so revolutionary that it remained available until 1952 with only minor modifications, and variations with the pattern. Models include; the Improved Bill Doak which was issued in 1931, Doak Kenworthy model in 1932, Model J in 1932, H3 3F three finger model in 1934, model H in 1942, and model 5BD in 1945. Doak's invention was the ancestor of all modern gloves.

 In 1923, Philip Kennedy of the Kennedy brothers, owners of the Ken-Wel Sporting Goods Co., filed for a patent, that would connect the fingers with lace. The main objective of the interlaced fingers was to create a deep pocket that would close around the ball when it hit the palm, and prevent the fingers from bending back from the speed of the ball, or spreading apart allowing the ball to get away. This new design was advertised to help prevent errors.

The first Ken-Wel model was endorsed by "Crack 3rd baseman of the Cincinnati Reds" Babe Pinelli. The glove featured leather tabs on the back of the fingers in which the lace ran though. The Dazzy Vance model followed the following year and became a mainstay in the Ken-Wel catalog into the 1940's. Sometime around 1934 eyelets in the fingers replaced the outer leather tabs. There were a number of feature variations through the years, that encluded a 3 finger model, and by 1940 a double tunnel web was added.

 Other companies also experimented with variations of the interlaced finger design, Goldsmith, Reach, Nocona... but all other glove models in the market were manufactured with split fingers, including the Ken-Wel catalog. This glove design did last through the 1940's, but it wasn't until the 1950's when laced fingers took hold ending the era of the split finger baseball glove.

You cannot have a discussion about innovative baseball glove design without dropping the name of Rawlings "Glove Doctor," Harry Latina. Assignee to Rawlings Latina took out some 30 patents for features such as adjustable thumb and pinky loops, the V-anchored web, and the “Edge-u-cated” heel. He designed such models as the Deep Well Pocket (1930), Trapper (1940), and V-Anchored Web (1950).

In 1939 Hank Greenberg's oversized first base mitt was the source of worry, and protest that led to Rule 21 (size & weight of gloves) to be rewritten that same year. Landis did not want the gloves to resemble a birds nest or a "lacrosse racquet." Interlocking fishnet type webbing was out. It was a fortuitous time for Latina. By 1940 he revolutionized the base mitt with his "Trapper" design, replacing the older "Oven Mitt" style.

  In 1940 Rawlings and Latina filed for a patent that was granted in 1942. The main object of Latina's invention was to provide a baseball mitt, which is of such design or construction that when it is subjected to the pressure of a caught ball, will automatically close around the ball, effectively "Trap" it. A design that also complies with the rules, regulations and requirements pertaining to such devices, and which has a ball back-stop that is more efficient than those employed in mitts of conventional design. The "Trapper model" is born.

 The glove was a hit with players however there was concern that the lacing could be loosened up to make the web bigger than the dimensions in the rule book for a legal glove. In 1950 modifications were made and a patent was applied for to place a "web controller" strap at the top of the web. That way, no matter how much you loosened up the laces, the web could only get as wide as the web controller, maintaining the legal distance between the thumb and forefinger.