[04] Ledger: Scores & Ballots

Cricket: the scorebook as a tally

A cricket scorebook is a ball-by-ball tally. Each delivery in an over gets a mark: a dot for no run, a numeral for runs, W for a wicket. When an over passes without a run, the six dots are joined to form an M — a maiden. Scorers also keep running totals for each batter and bowler, then reconcile all three columns at the end of an innings. If the sums disagree, the scorers recount ball by ball.

Bill Frindall, scorer for BBC radio's Test Match Special from 1966 until his death in 2009, popularised a linear method that records each ball in sequence across the page, so any moment of a match can be reconstructed. Verdict: the most detailed hand tally in mainstream sport.

Baseball: the scorecard

The baseball scorecard grew out of the work of Henry Chadwick, the 19th-century writer credited with the box score and with using K for a strikeout. Each fielder is a number, each plate appearance a diamond, each out a tally. Fans still keep cards by hand at the ballpark — one of the few places where hand tallying is a leisure activity.

Games: the peg as a tally

Cribbage, attributed to the poet Sir John Suckling in the 17th century, is scored by moving pegs along holes on a board; a standard game runs to 121. The board is a physical tally that cannot be accidentally erased, and the trailing peg shows the previous score — a built-in audit trail. Darts takes the other route: chalk totals subtracted from 501, rewritten after every visit.

Ballots: counts with consequences

Hand counting remains standard in several democracies:

• United Kingdom: at parliamentary counts, staff first verify the number of ballot papers against the number issued, then sort and count votes by hand in the presence of candidates and agents.
• Canada: federal ballots are counted by hand at each polling station after polls close, with candidates' representatives allowed to observe.
• Taiwan: at each station an official reads every ballot aloud and holds it up, while another marks 正 on a public board. Anyone in the room can follow the tally stroke by stroke.

Verdict: Taiwan's public 正 board is the purest modern example of the tally as a trust device — the count is visible while it happens.

Stocktakes and inventory

Retail stocktakes, cellar counts and warehouse cycle counts still lean on paper tally sheets and clickers when scanners cannot reach. The standard control is a blind second count: a different person counts without seeing the first figure, and only discrepancies are rechecked.

Side by side