Arch Ward, sports editor of the Chicago Tribune, suggested a baseball game to be played at Comiskey Park matching the best players in the American League against the best players in the National League. Labeling it “the game of the century,” he was certain it would be a success. Fan interest was sure to be high, but to make it even more so, he would have the fans select the players. But before any announcement of such a game could be made, Ward had to ascertain if his dream was feasible. The first person he consulted was American League President Will Harridge.

Ward was prepared to drop the whole scheme if he could not get Harridge’s approval. To Ward’s delight, Harridge not only approved, he promised to recommend it to the eight American League club owners. The following day, Ward explained the plan to William E. Veeck, president of the Chicago Cubs. Veeck loved the idea and promised to lobby for the game with the other National League owners. A call by Ward to National League President John Heydler also elicited a promise to discuss the proposed game with those owners.

On May 9, at a special meeting in Cleveland, the American League owners enthusiastically voted in favor of the game and chose July 6 as the date. However, a few days later, Ward received a telegram from Heydler informing him that three NL owners — the Giants’ Charles Stoneham, the Braves’ Charles Adams, and the Cardinals’ Sam Breadon — had turned down the idea.

Breadon based his opposition on the fear that any future games, as this one was doing, would be forced to donate the proceeds to charity. Stoneham and Adams opposed the idea because of the selected date. The Giants and Braves were scheduled to play a doubleheader in Boston on July 5, making it impossible for any chosen players to be in Chicago in time to play on July 6.

Breadon dropped his opposition after Ward convinced him that other cities, including St. Louis, could benefit by hosting a future All-Star Game. The only obstacle remaining was the July 5 Giants-Braves doubleheader. After National League owners persuaded Heydler to postpone that doubleheader, a contract was signed by Ward, representing the Tribune, Heydler, and Harridge.

Editors at the Tribune had thought it unlikely other newspapers would do anything to help publicize a rival newspaper, yet all 55 Ward had asked to join in, accepted. In a gesture of cooperation, they even volunteered to help in the polling. The idea captured the imagination of fans everywhere, who then took the opportunity to vote for the players they most wanted to see.

Chicago White Sox outfielder Al Simmons, tied with Washington manager-shortstop Joe Cronin for the league lead in batting, got the most votes, 346,291. Philadelphia Phillies outfielder Chuck Klein, the National League’s leading hitter, was also its leading vote-getter, with 342,283.

The final rosters, 18 players per league, were determined by a combination of the fans’ votes and the selections of the respective managers. The players would not be paid for participating, but would benefit indirectly by the net receipts of $46,506 the game raised for the Association of Professional Baseball Players of America.   

The two most honored managers in the game, one from each league, were selected to lead their respective teams. John McGraw had stepped down in June 1932 after 30 years at the helm of the New York Giants, but the National League called him out of retirement to manage this one game. The Americans gave the managerial honors to Connie Mack, who had led the Athletics since the league’s birth. 

The regular season would resume the following day, although the owners had agreed that if the All-Star Game was rained out, they would cancel the next day’s schedule and play it then. That precaution proved unnecessary; the weather was perfect and though the country was struggling through the worst economic crisis in its history, every seat was filled.

For all sections of the park, patrons had been allowed to buy only four tickets, and there was no standing room. All seats were priced the same as for regular-season games at Comiskey Park, and because they played the game under “World Series rules,” no spectators would be allowed on the field. The crowd of 47,595, conducted itself in an exemplary manner, as if each fan knew he was witnessing something special.           

The American League stars won the game, 4-2, but both sides offered strong pitching, solid hitting, and near-flawless defense. Yankees first baseman Lou Gehrig’s drop of Philadelphia Phillies shortstop Dick Bartell’s foul pop in the fifth inning was the game’s only error.       

Babe Ruth, 38 years old and nearing the end of his career, provided the AL’s margin of victory with the first home run in All-Star competition, a third-inning two-run blast. It came off National League starter Bill Hallahan of St. Louis and increased the American League’s lead to 3-0.     

Five days before the game, McGraw and Mack had announced that the starting pitchers would be Carl Hubbell of the Giants and Lefty Grove of the A’s, the game’s two best left-handers. But both managers changed their minds on game day, although both stayed with left-handers: McGraw went with Hallahan (10-4), while Mack chose the Yankees’ Lefty Gomez (9-6).

Current Giants manager Bill Terry captained the National Leaguers, who had the words “NATIONAL LEAGUE” on the fronts of their gray road uniforms with an “NL” emblazoned on their caps. Tigers second baseman Charlie Gehringer captained the Americans, each of whom wore his regular home uniform.           

To help familiarize themselves with the other league, both teams used the other’s ball during batting practice to acclimate themselves to the different constructions. An American League ball, reputed to be livelier, would be used for the first 4½ innings, before the teams switched to the thicker-covered National League ball.          

At 1:15 P.M., home-plate umpire Bill Dinneen of the American League called “Play Ball!” and Cardinals third baseman Pepper Martin stepped in as the first All-Star batter. Gomez retired him on a groundball to shortstop Cronin, and the “dream game” had become a reality. In the second inning, the American Leaguers scored the first All-Star run, helped along by the wildness of Hallahan, who not for nothing was known as “Wild Bill.”1 After walking White Sox third baseman Jimmy Dykes and Cronin, he yielded a two-out single to Gomez, a historically weak batter, that scored Dykes.

When Hallahan walked Gehrig following Ruth’s third-inning home run, McGraw replaced him with Cubs right-hander Lon Warneke. Meanwhile, Gomez held the National Leaguers scoreless in his three innings, as did Washington’s Alvin Crowder in the fourth and fifth. The Nationals finally broke through in the sixth. Warneke hit a one-out triple, a long fly down the right-field line that was poorly handled by Ruth, and scored as Martin was grounding out. Frankie Frisch, manager-second baseman of the Cardinals, followed with a home run to cut the AL’s lead to 3-2.   

Warneke had already pitched three full innings, and had raced around the bases in the top of the sixth; nevertheless, McGraw sent him out to pitch the home half of the inning. The American Leaguers quickly got a run back on a single by Cronin, a sacrifice by Rick Ferrell, and a single by Cleveland’s Earl Averill, batting for Crowder. Ferrell, the Red Sox’ lone representative, caught the entire game, despite having finished third in the voting behind the Yankees’ Bill Dickey and Philadelphia’s Mickey Cochrane, both of whom were injured.  

Hubbell and Grove came on in the seventh. Hubbell, who had shut out the Cardinals, 1-0, in 18 innings four days earlier, pitched two innings, blanking the American Leaguers on one hit. Grove pitched the final three innings for the AL, also allowing no runs, though the National Leaguers threatened in both the seventh and the eighth.          

They had runners on second and third in the seventh, with just one out, but Grove struck out the Cubs’ Gabby Hartnett and got Hartnett’s Chicago teammate, Woody English, on a fly ball. Then in the eighth, with two out and Frisch, who had singled, on first, Hafey hit what would have been a game-tying home run in a park less spacious than Comiskey. Ruth ran it down and caught it with his back pressed to the right-field wall. Grove retired the National Leaguers one-two-three in the ninth, and the “game of the century” was over.           

McGraw went to the winners’ locker room to congratulate Mack, his longtime rival, and Ruth, whom he had often denigrated in the past.       

Both managers said they hoped the game would be repeated annually.

This essay was adapted from the author’s article on the 1933 All-Star Game that appeared in “The Midsummer Classic: The Complete History of Baseball’s All-Star Game” (Bison Books, 2001).

Sources

The author also accessed Retrosheet.org, Baseball-Reference.com, and SABR.org.

Notes

1 Hallahan walked five in his two-plus innings, which remain the most walks given up by a pitcher in one All-Star Game.

The idea for a Negro League all-star game is attributed to sportswriters Roy Sparrow of the Pittsburgh Sun-Telegraph and Bill Nunn of the Pittsburgh Courier in July of 1933. Gus Greenlee, owner of the Pittsburgh Crawfords, suggested that the writers contact Robert Cole, owner of the Chicago American Giants, and look into holding an East-West game at Comiskey Park in Chicago. The deal was made with Cole, the park was secured for a September 10 date, and publicity began in earnest. The game would annually prove to be “the pinnacle of any Negro League season,” wrote Negro Leagues historian Larry Lester. “It was an all-star game and a World Series all wrapped in one spectacle.”2

Fans could vote for their favorite players through African-American newspapers including the Chicago Defender, Pittsburgh Courier, Kansas City Call, and Baltimore Afro-American. The significance was monumental, as Negro League legend Buck O’Neil remembered. “While the big leaguers left the choice of players up to the sportswriters, Gus (Greenlee) left it up to the fans. After reading about great players in the Defender and Courier for so many years, they could cut out that ballot in the black papers, send it in, and have a say. That was a pretty important thing for black people to do in those days, to be able to vote, even if it was just for ballplayers, and they sent in thousands and thousands of ballots.”3

With just over a million votes cast, Oscar Charleston of the Pittsburgh Crawfords received the most votes, 43,793, while Willie Foster of the Chicago American Giants was runner-up with 40,637. Each was joined by six teammates in the starting lineups.4 The crowd of 19,568 braved the drizzly weather, many arriving on packed train cars. The Illinois Central Railroad needed a special coach to bring fans in from New Orleans, while others arrived by rail from Mississippi and Tennessee. The Sante Fe Chief brought fans from Kansas City and Wichita, while the New York Central brought fans from the East.5 “The depression didn’t stop ’em — the rain couldn’t —and so a howling, thundering mob of 20,000 souls braved an early downpour and a threatening storm to see the pick of the East’s baseball players battle the pick of the West,” wrote Al Monroe in the Chicago Defender.6 With such high stakes, the Kansas City Call thought Greenlee must have “lost 10 pounds worrying over the possibility that rain might ruin the game.”7

Around 2:30 P.M. the umpires, Costello, Cusack, Baldwin, and Stack, “moved from beneath the home dugout like groundhogs searching for that proverbial shadow, only braving steady drizzle to yell the usual ‘Play ball!’” West was the home team, and Foster stood on the mound in the drizzle staring in at Cool Papa Bell. The “Game of Games” was on.

Bell flied out to left, and both clubs went quietly in the first two innings, with Sam Streeter of Pittsburgh on the hill for the East. Jud Wilson’s single in the second for the East was the first hit in the history of the East-West game. In the bottom of the third, Sam Bankhead of Nashville beat out an infield hit, the West’s first hit of the game. Moving to second on a groundout, Bankhead scored the first run in the game’s history, on a single by Chicago’s Turkey Stearnes.

Trailing 1-0 in the top of the fourth, the East got its first two men aboard when Rap Dixon of the Philadelphia Stars walked and Charleston was hit by a pitch. They performed a double steal while Biz Mackey of Philadelphia struck out. Wilson, also of Philadelphia, grounded to second. Leroy Morney of the Cleveland Giants threw wildly to the plate and both Dixon and Charleston scored, with Wilson taking second. Dick Lundy of Philadelphia walked and Vic Harris of the Homestead Grays grounded to Morney, who booted an easy double-play opportunity. The bases were loaded. John Henry Russell laid down a perfect suicide-squeeze bunt along the first-base line, scoring Wilson. The East now led, 3-1.

The lead changed quickly in the bottom of the inning. Chicago’s Willie Wells doubled and scored on teammate Steel Arm Davis’s double to cut the East’s lead to 3-2. Chicago’s Mule Suttles received a strong ovation from the crowd “because Mule, to colored fandom,” wrote William Nunn of the Pittsburgh Courier, “is what Ruth is to major-league baseball.”8 Suttles smashed a home run into the upper deck in left-center to give the West a 4-3 lead. “With hardly any effort he swung,” Nunn wrote. “Like a bullet from a rifle. ‘Cool Papa’ Bell started to run. Suddenly he stopped. Pandemonium reigned. Straw hats filled the air … worth the price of admission any day.”9 The first home run in the East-West game was indeed a memorable one. Naturally, it was Ruth who hit the first home run in the major-league All-Star Game two months earlier, in the same park.

The East countered with two runs in the top of the fifth when Dixon reached on a checked-swing roller in front of the plate. Charleston was again hit by a pitch and Mackey blooped a single to load the bases with one out. Wilson singled to left, scoring Dixon and Charleston to give the East a 5-4 lead. Lundy hit a fly ball to right that scored Mackey, but an appeal play resulted in Mackey being called out for leaving third too soon. In the bottom of the fifth, Larry Brown of Chicago tripled to center but was tagged out when he overran third base.

The West struck again in the bottom of the sixth. Wells singled and scored on a double by Alex Radcliffe of Chicago to tie the score, 5-5. As the rain came down, Bertram Hunter of Pittsburgh came in from the bullpen to pitch for the East. Suttles was clutch again, doubling to right, scoring Radcliffe, and then he too scored on single by Morney. Brown singled to right but Morney was out on an appeal play when he failed to touch second base on the way by. Despite the blunder, the West now led, 7-5.

Josh Gibson was now catching for the East in the bottom of the seventh. A leadoff single by Foster, the first such by a pitcher in the game’s history, led to a pitching change; George Britt of the Homestead Grays came in to pitch. Stearnes doubled to right, sending Foster to third. A fly ball by Wells scored Foster. Davis doubled to right, scoring Stearnes. Radcliffe’s single and a misplay by Harris in left field scored Davis. The West led, 10-5.

In the top of the eighth the East put the first two runners on when Gibson and pinch-hitter Judy Johnson singled, but both were stranded when Foster got Lundy to line out, Fats Jenkins to ground out, and Russell to pop out. The West added a run in the bottom of the eighth. The East scored two in the top of the ninth on flies by Dixon and Charleston, but Gibson lined out to Davis in left for the final out of the West’s 11-7 victory.

Every player in the lineup for the West had at least one hit, with six players having two each of the 15 total. Foster pitched the entire game, allowing the East only seven hits and three earned runs. While Nunn called it “a game which produced thrills galore,” one of the game’s greats didn’t show.10 Satchel Paige declined the invitation and remained in the hills of North Dakota, pitching for his integrated Bismarck semipro team.11

The only mention of the game in the Chicago Tribune was a two-paragraph item under a Dick Tracy comic strip.12 The Sporting News, the self-proclaimed “Baseball Paper of the World,” didn’t mention the “Game of Games.” Undeniable, however, was the conversation around baseball that resulted from it.

Henry L. Ferrell of the Chicago Daily News quipped that Charleston, Suttles, and Lundy would each get a major-league contract if the they “were of a lighter shade.”13 Ferrell also believed some cities wanted to see a winner, no matter the color of their skin. The East team, he said, “might well be moved as a unit into Cincinnati or Boston, where the long suffering patrons of the Reds and the Red Sox have been praying for a magic rod to strike a rock and appease their thirst for a team.”

The Chicago Defender wrote in its September 16 issue, “If the white club owners of the National and American leagues would surrender their prejudices and recognize fitness and ability instead of color, baseball would be established firmly on the grounds of clean and wholesome sport.” The East-West game reportedly outdrew the crowd across town watching the Cubs play a doubleheader at Wrigley Field.14 “Professional baseball has been and is losing thousands of dollars yearly by its narrow and asinine prejudiced attitude in the operation of the national game,” the Defender wrote. “We ask again: What is the matter with baseball? The answer is, plain prejudice — that’s all.”

It would be several years before baseball dealt with its “prejudiced attitude,” but the “Game of Games” was an early sign of better days ahead.

Sources

Dickson, Paul. “The Negro Leagues East-West All-Star Game,” The National Pastime Museum. March 12, 2017. Retrieved August 19, 2017. https://thenationalpastimemuseum.com/article/negro-leagues-east-west-all-star-game.

Photo credit: Mule Suttles, Trading Card Database.

Notes

1 Larry Lester, Black Baseball’s National Showcase: The East-West All-Star Game, 1933-1953. (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2001), 25.

2 Lester, 1.

3 Lester, 3.

4 Lester, 37. The rest of the top 10 in voting: Turkey Stearnes 39,994; Willie Wells 39,136; Newt Allen 39,092; Jud Wilson 37,681; Alec Radcliffe 36,712; Josh Gibson 35,376; Mule Suttles 35,134; John Henry Russell 29,846.

5 Lester, 3.

6 Al Monroe, “20,000 See West Beat East in Baseball ‘Game of Games,’” Chicago Defender, September 16, 1933. Reprinted in Lester, 30-31.

7 “Heavy Hitting Beats East in Classic,” Kansas City Call, September 15, 1933. Reprinted in Lester, 30.

8 William G. Nunn, “West’s Satellites Eclipse Stars of the East in Classic,” Pittsburgh Courier, September 16, 1933. Reprinted in Lester, 32.

9 Ibid.

10 Nunn.

11 “Satchel Paige and Barney Brown are Expected to Pitch,” Bismarck Tribune, September 9, 1933: 6; Lester, 42.

12 “West Victor, 11-7, in Negro All-Star Game,” Chicago Tribune, September 11, 1933: 21.

13 “Charleston, Lundy, Suttles Ranked as ‘Major League Timber,’” Pittsburgh Courier, September 16, 1933: 5.

14 Attendance numbers are not available for that game.

The follow-up to the inaugural All-Star Game, played the year before at Comiskey Park in Chicago, was a hit again as more than 48,000 fans came to the Polo Grounds in New York to see a wild game.

The National League built a 4-0 lead after three innings. The runs came on a lead-off home run by Frank Frisch and a three-run homer by Joe Medwick, both off American League starter Lefty Gomez. However, the main story occurring in the early innings was not in how the National League got its runs but how the American League stayed scoreless during this time.

Hubbell, pitching in the home park of his New York Giants, was following up on a year in which he had led the National League with 23 wins, a 1.66 earned-run average, and 10 shutouts. At the time of the 1934 All-Star Game, he had 12 wins, on his way to 21 for the year (the second of five consecutive seasons in which he topped 20 wins) and another league-leading ERA. In the All-Star Game, Hubbell had a shaky start. He gave up a leadoff single to Charlie Gehringer (who made it to second on when Wally Berger fumbled the ball) and walked Heinie Manush. The American League had two on with no out and an incredible heart of the order coming up. No problem for Hubbell, who relied on his screwball to strike out Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, and, after a double steal, Jimmy Foxx.

Hubbell didn’t let up in the second, fanning Al Simmons and Joe Cronin. Bill Dickey singled to break the strike-out streak, but Hubbell finished the inning by striking out Gomez. Years later, the legend became one of Hubbell striking out six Hall of Famers (although, of course, Gomez made the Hall for his pitching, not hitting, ability). At the time, there was no Hall of Fame, but the feat was still noted. The Sporting News wrote, “Carl’s fanning Ruth, Gehrig, Foxx, Simmons, and Cronin in succession amounted to one of the greatest pitching achievements of modern times.1”

Hubbell pitched a scoreless third, as well, but NL manager Bill Terry didn’t have anyone of his caliber to follow. Terry tried Lon Warneke of the Cubs in the fourth, but the Arkansas Hummingbird wasn’t up to Hubbell’s performance. Warneke retired Foxx, the first batter he faced, but then gave up a double to Simmons. Cronin followed with a run-scoring single and, one out later, came home on a pinch-hit triple by Earl Averill to cut the Nationals’ lead in half.

Trouble continued in the fifth, and Warneke gave way to Van Lingle Mungo after walking Ruth and Gehrig, the first two batters in the inning. Foxx greeted Mungo with a single on the first pitch, scoring Ruth and sending Gehrig to third. Simmons beat out an infield hit as Gehrig scored to tie the score 4-4. After Cronin, trying to bunt, popped out, Dickey walked to load the bases. Averill, who had remained in the game after batting for Gomez the previous inning, produced another extra-base hit, doubling to right to score two runs and put the Americans ahead. Red Ruffing, who had pitched a scoreless fourth, drove home two more with a single, giving the American League a six-run inning and an 8-4 lead in the game.

Back on the mound in the bottom of the fifth, Ruffing was roughed up. A leadoff walk to Pepper Martin followed by singles to Frisch, Pie Traynor, and Chuck Klein finished Ruffing. Harder came into a situation with two runs already in, two on, and no out. The Cleveland right-hander allowed another of Ruffing’s runners to score (on a steal of home by Traynor as part of a double steal) but got out of the inning while preserving the American League’s lead, which had been cut to 8-7.

The American League completed the scoring in the sixth with another run on doubles by Simmons and Cronin off Dizzy Dean. The slugfest concluded with a 9-7 win for the Americans, their second straight win in what was becoming a regular summertime event. The Sporting News wrote, “As a result of the widespread interest the game generated throughout the county and the fact that it is a charitable enterprise, devoid of any mark of commercialism, baseball leaders see in it a fine thing for the propagation of the sport nationally and at the December meetings the club owners are expected to go on record to make it a yearly fixture.”2

The All-Star Game did become a yearly fixture although over the years it could no longer be said that the game was “devoid of any mark of commercialism.” Nevertheless, the excitement of seeing the game’s greatest names assembled on one diamond each summer has continued. The 1934 All-Star Game met expectations in terms of interest and entertainment of the game itself. Even though his outstanding outing did not result in his team’s winning the game, Carl Hubbell stamped his name on this one with a performance that lives on in the lore as one of the most memorable All-Star Games ever.

All-Star notes:

Although the 1934 All-Star Game is remembered for Carl Hubbell’s string of strikeouts, walks were nearly as plentiful in the game. The teams combined for 12 walks, 9 given up by the National League (including 2 by Hubbell). Robert D. Maley, the self-proclaimed sole member of the “Bureau of Unvital Statistics,” tracked the pitches in the game with a breakdown on what happened with every pitch from each pitcher.3 National League hurlers threw 182 pitches, 102 of which were strikes (including balls put into play). Starter Carl Hubbell threw 32 strikes and 21 balls. Warneke threw more balls than strikes (21 to 20). Van Lingle Mungo and Fred Frankhouse were even in balls and strikes (13 each for Mungo and 6 each for Frankhouse). The American League issued only three walks and, as would be expected, had a better overall strike-to-ball breakdown: 96 strikes and 48 balls. Starter Lefty Gomez delivered 28 strikes and 12 balls.

Billy Herman of the National League entered the game twice. Herman hit for Hubbell in the third inning. Later in the game, National League manager Bill Terry needed someone to take over for Frisch. According to The Sporting News, Frisch was troubled by charley horses, and the play-by-play account in Retrosheet notes that Frisch sprained his foot while scoring a run in the fifth. Frisch played another inning in the field. In the seventh, Terry requested that Herman be allowed to re-enter the game to relieve Frisch at second base. American League manager Joe Cronin gave his permission, and Herman went back into the game.

One other All-Star Game was played at the Polo Grounds, in 1942, and was the first All-Star Game to be played at night. According to David Vincent, Lyle Spatz, and David W. Smith in The Midsummer Classic: The Complete History of Baseball’s All-Star Game, the game was originally scheduled for Ebbets Field in Brooklyn.4 However, the game was moved to the Polo Grounds, which had greater capacity, to allow for a bigger crowd since the gate proceeds were going to charities related to the war effort. A crowd of 34,178 attended and saw the American League win 3-1. The Americans did all their scoring in the first, on a lead-off home run by Lou Boudreau and a two-run homer by Rudy York. The game began at 7:21 p.m. (nearly an hour later than scheduled because of rain) and ended at 9:28, two minutes before a blackout test scheduled for New York City.

Sources

Play-by-play available from Baseball Reference and Retrosheet.

https://www.baseball-reference.com/allstar/1934-allstar-game.shtml

http://www.retrosheet.org/boxesetc/1934/B07100NLS1934.htm

Notes

The summer of 1934 was one of the hottest on record in Chicago. Although the heat was nothing out of the ordinary for Negro League All-Stars like Alex Radcliff and Satchel Paige, who both grew up in Mobile, Alabama, it was still fortunate for them, and for the fans attending the matchup of the best that Black baseball had to offer that season, that the temperatures cooled slightly from the record-setting 105 degrees of July 24 and the 100 degrees of August 8. August 26 was, as one observer put it, “one of those perfect baseball days. Not a cloud in the sky to mar the perfect azure-blue of the heavens.”1

What the weather may have lacked in heat, the annual East-West All-Star Game, played at Comiskey Park, made up for. It was a hotly contested game.

Although it was an exhibition, both teams wanted nothing more than to win. The 1934 edition of the classic turned out to be a pitchers’ duel if ever there was one. The East team won, 1-0, on a run that crossed the plate in the next-to-last inning.

Until then, the West pitching had been excellent. Ted Trent started and allowed two hits while striking out three batters. He was helped by top-notch defense, with Sammy Hughes and Willie Wells making great plays in the infield. Chet Brewer pitched the middle three innings, yielding two hits and striking out a pair of batters including Oscar Charleston, who struck out twice in the game. Willie Foster entered the game in the seventh inning and allowed a two-out single to Chester Williams, who was stranded when Paige grounded out to shortstop.

Cool Papa Bell, one of six Pittsburgh Crawfords to start the game, scored the game’s only run, in the top half of the eighth inning. Bell was known throughout the Negro Leagues as an excellent baserunner. According to Ted “Double Duty” Radcliffe, Bell was “so fast, he’d run out of sight.”2 (Double Duty was the brother of Alex Radcliff, who started at third base for the West team.)3

Bell was an on-base artist extraordinaire, who knew how to work pitch counts when necessary to reach first base. His pesky ways got only more annoying for opposing pitchers, catchers, and managers once he got on base, and that was most certainly the case in the eighth inning of this game. Facing hometown pitcher Foster of the Chicago American Giants, Bell worked the count to 3-and-1 and then took first on a base on balls. It was the only walk Foster issued in three innings of mound work.

Pittsburgh Crawfords catcher Bill Perkins was up next, pinch-hitting for Jimmie Crutchfield, was up next. Bell used his legendary speed to steal second base on a swinging strikeout by Perkins. Pittsburgh first baseman Oscar Charleston then hit a soft liner to first baseman Mule Suttles for the second out. Philadelphia Stars third baseman Jud Wilson, “one of the game’s most dangerous hitters,” was down in the count 0-and-2 when he “hit a looping single over second. It was a hit, but [shortstop] Willie Wells and [second baseman Sammy] Hughes both went for it.”4 With two outs, Bell had been off on contact. Both Wells and Hughes “broke the ball down, but it rolled a few feet away.”5

The New York Amsterdam News described the hit as a “fast grounder through the pitcher’s box out into short center field.”6 As both middle infielders went for the ball, “Wells got in front of it” but “Hughes crashed into him and Bell scampered about third to score.”7 Josh Gibson was up next and he singled, but the throw from right fielder Sam Bankhead was relayed home and caught Wilson as he tried to score a second run.

In the bottom of the ninth, Paige stuck out Turkey Stearnes and, after a single by Suttles, the game ended on a double play as Williams grabbed a liner by Red Parnell and doubled off pinch-runner Malvin Powell at first base.

Paige, who had entered the game with none out in the sixth inning and a runner on second base, struck out five batters. He prevented the West from scoring in the four innings he pitched and was the pitcher of record when the winning run was scored. As the third and final pitcher (following starter Ted Trent and Chet Brewer) used by West manager Dave Malarcher, Foster took the loss in the contest.8

Wilson’s Philadelphia Stars went on to win the 1934 Negro National League II championship by defeating the Chicago American Giants in a playoff series; it was the only championship in franchise history. For the moment, however, the big news was that Wilson had played the role of hero in a game that had included stars like Wells, Charleston, Stearnes, and Josh Gibson. Wilson had been second in vote-getting among East position players, and he was such a strong hitter that East manager Dick Lundy had batted him in the cleanup spot for the East. If anyone was likely to drive in the only run in a 1-0 game, Wilson was the one who was the most probable. As it turned out, he had his opportunity and made the most of it.

In addition to Wilson, credit for the East’s victory was also due to the sterling efforts of the three pitchers used by Lundy (who doubled as the starting shortstop). Philadelphia’s Slim Jones was the starter. His day got off to an inauspicious start as he walked the leadoff hitter, Wells, and then balked him to second. Wells was thrown out trying to steal third, as Alex Radcliff struck out.9 Jones struck out Stearnes to end the inning. He pitched two more innings in which he allowed just one more baserunner. He struck out four West All-Stars in his three innings on the hill.

However, there were some anxious moments in the second inning. After Suttles opened the inning with a single, Parnell reached base on an error when second baseman Williams’s throw was mishandled at first base by Charleston. After Bankhead struck out, the runners advanced to second and third on a wild pitch. Suttles tried to score on Larry Brown’s groundball to third base, but Jud Wilson’s timely throw home to catcher Gibson prevented the run from scoring. Hughes grounded out to Wilson to end the threat.

After Jones retired the side in order in the third inning, he was relieved by Pittsburgh Crawfords right-hander Harry “Tin Can” Kincannon. The curveball artist was not as sharp for the East squad as his predecessor or his successor. In two innings of relief, he gave up four hits but continued to keep the West team with a zero in the run column as he bridged the gap to the most dominant Negro Leagues pitcher of the era, Leroy “Satchel” Paige. Mule Suttles was thrown out at home after tripling in the fourth inning. Right fielder Crutchfield grabbed a fly ball hit by Parnell and executed a perfect throw to end the inning.

Pitching in this contest against the best Negro Leagues competition he could face, Paige, who entered the game with none out and a runner on second in the sixth inning, powered through the West lineup with his blazing, heavy fastball for four shutout innings to record the win for the East squad. He used his fastball, curveball, changeup, and even occasional knuckleball to confuse West hitters and keep them off balance.

According to both Bell and Double Duty Radcliffe, Paige threw his fastball as fast as anyone in the Negro Leagues. Radcliffe had caught him when they were teammates with the Crawfords in 1932. He recalled a doubleheader in New York in which he caught Paige in game one, and then took the mound himself in the second game. Both pitched shutouts.

Asked if Paige threw hard, Radcliffe said, “When I had to catch Satchel, I’d go to the store to get a wrap.” He asserted that “Nobody who ever lived threw harder than Satchel. Closest was Bob Gibson. Satchel could throw so hard, looked like the ball disappeared.”10

In addition to the players who were key figures in the East’s victory, the 1934 East-West All-Star Game featured much of the best talent the Negro Leagues ever produced. In the midst of that talent, some individual standouts, who did not necessarily affect the final outcome of the game, were Pittsburgh second baseman Chester Williams for the East and Chicago first baseman Mule Suttles for the West, who collected three hits apiece.

For the 30,000 fans in attendance, the second annual East-West Game did not disappoint.11 They got every bit of their money’s worth as they watched the East avenge an 11-7 loss in the inaugural East-West All-Star Game from the year before. In the Pittsburgh Courier’s September 1 edition, columnist William G. Nunn raved, “Today’s game was more than a masterpiece! It was more than a classic! It was really and truly a diamond epic!”12

Sources

This article was amended by Alan Cohen and Bill Nowlin in 2023 and fact-checked by Carl Riechers. Thanks to Alan Cohen and Tom Thress of Retrosheet. In addition to the sources cited in the Notes, the authors consulted Retrosheet.org and the following:

“East-West All Star Game: Summaries,” http://www.cnlbr.org/Portals/0/RL/East-West%20All%20Star%20Game%20Summaries%202019-10.pdf

Lester, Larry. Black Baseball’s National Showcase: The East-West All-Star Game 1933-1962, Expanded Version (Kansas City: Noir Tech Research, 2020), 40-59.

Mandel, Ken, MLB.com. Slim Pitcher: Jones Dominated Negro League Baseball for a Short Time. mlb.mlb.com/mlb/history/mlb_negro_leagues_profile.jsp?player=jones_stuart.

Monroe, Al. “East Beats West in 1-0 Thriller,” Chicago Defender, September 1, 1934: 16.

Thorn, John, Black Ball, Part 2. “Our Game,” ourgame.mlblogs.com/black-ball-part-2-1dcade51cdf6.

Washington, Chester. “Says Ches: 25,000 Thrilled at East-West Spectacle,” Pittsburgh Courier, September 1, 1934: A5.

“Bat Boys Responsible for East Team’s 1-0 Victory,” Chicago Defender, September 1, 1934: 15.

“East All-Star Team Wins, 1-0, Before 25,000,” Chicago Tribune, August 27, 1934: 21.

Notes

1 William G. Nunn, “As ‘Speedball’ Satchell [sic] Paige Ambled into the East-West Game and Simply Stole the Show,” Pittsburgh Courier, September 1, 1934: A4.

2 Ted “Double Duty” Radcliffe, interviewed by Fay Vincent, Society for American Baseball Research, July 5, 2002. https://sabr.org/interview/ted-double-duty-radcliffe-2002/.

3 Alex Radcliff’s surname was sometimes rendered as Radcliffe.

4 Nunn.

5 Nunn.

6 “East Defeats West in Game at Chicago,” New York Amsterdam News, September 1, 1934: 10.

7 Dan Burley (Associated Negro Press), “East Shuts Out West in Classic Title, 1-0,” Atlanta Daily World, September 2, 1934: 5.

8 For a box score of the game, see Al Monroe, “East Beats West in 1-0 Thriller,” Chicago Defender, September 1, 1934: 16.

9 Julius J. Adams, “Adams Gives a Detailed Story of East’s Victory,” Chicago Defender, September 1, 1934: 17.

10 Ted “Double Duty” Radcliffe interview.

11 Estimates of crowd size ranged from 20,000 to 30,000. Nunn wrote that more than 4,000 of those in attendance were White.

12 Nunn.

Frisch had recently created some controversy. After an exhibition game on July 5 in St. Paul, Minnesota, he declared that Cardinals ace Dizzy Dean would not start in the All-Star Game on July 8. Apparently Frisch was angry because Dean and his brother Paul Dean had refused to participate in any way in the exhibition game, even as base coaches. When the Deans went so far as to refuse to be introduced to the St. Paul fans, Frisch had seen enough. In the end, Frisch relented, and Dizzy was allowed back on the 20-man NL roster, to be joined by six other Cardinals teammates.

Dean reversed the tables on Frankie Frisch a couple of days later. The train to Cleveland for the All-Star Game made a stop at a small Indiana town. Dean got out on the platform in his stocking feet to sign autographs. He noticed that Frisch was not out doing the same, and called for him to join him on the platform. When Frisch refused, Dean threatened to fine Frisch. He later told the press that he let him off with only a warning.

Charlie Gehringer, who had been the fans’ choice at second base in 1933 and ’34, was selected for the team by Cochrane. Joining him from the Tigers were pitchers Tommy Bridges and Schoolboy Rowe. It was Bridges’ second time as an All-Star; Rowe’s first.

The game was played on Monday, July 8, at Cleveland Municipal Stadium, which had opened for baseball in 1931. Bridges had been the starting pitcher for the Tigers just two days before, but had lasted only two innings against the St. Louis Browns. Rowe had pitched seven innings in relief on July 6, and two on July 7. Cochrane announced that neither would start the All-Star Game, but would be used in relief if needed. Rowe predicted that the game would be a low-scoring affair and that four runs would win the game. Cochrane chose the Yankees’ Lefty Gomez as the AL starter for the third consecutive year, while Frisch named the Cardinals’ Bill Walker to start.

Cochrane had originally wanted to go with Bill Dickey as the American League’s starting catcher. But the Yankee was nursing a leg injury, so Cochrane replaced him with Rollie Hemsley of the St. Louis Browns. Cochrane also picked Rick Ferrell to be a catcher on the AL squad. This gave the American League three receivers, including Cochrane himself. But it was Cochrane’s choices at first base and third base that created a controversy.

Cochrane picked his former teammate Jimmie Foxx as the third baseman and the Yankees’ Lou Gehrig to play first. This was a curious selection, as Foxx had played very little third base for the last five years. In fact, the most he’d played at the position in a season in the previous five years was 26 games in 1931. In 1935 Foxx had played just two games at third. Even more peculiar, Foxx was the only third baseman on the American League roster, and Gehrig was the only first baseman.

Here was the controversy: Cochrane had left Tigers first baseman Hank Greenberg off the team. Greenberg was leading the league in home runs (25) and RBIs (103) at the All-Star break. (He ended the season leading the major leagues with 36 homers and 170 RBIs.) Gehrig at the break had less than half of Greenberg’s totals, 11 homers and 51 RBIs. Some argued that Greenberg had had a bad World Series in 1934 and would probably not respond well in a big game. The flip side of the argument was that Gehrig had gone hitless in his two All-Star Games, in addition to committing the only errors charged to the American League squad in both contests.

Greenberg, however, said he was not upset, as he was sure he would be on the roster in 1936. But as things turned out he was not, because he had a broken wrist. As for Gehrig, he played the entire game at first base for its first five years, even though this was a time when the American League was stacked with first basemen. Besides Gehrig and Greenberg, Jimmie Foxx was the regular first baseman in Philadelphia, and Hal Trosky was a star in Cleveland. All four topped 100 RBIs and slugged over 25 homers in 1935.

Detroiters venturing to Cleveland to take in the game had a couple of travel options. For $5 one could take a ferry from Detroit’s Third Street dock on Saturday, July 6, or Sunday, July 7. After traveling on Lake Erie, passengers arrived at Cleveland’s East Ninth Street pier, which was only a few hundred feet from Municipal Stadium. One could return on Monday, July 8, at 11:30 P.M. and arrive in Detroit on Tuesday at 7 A.M.

And of course, one could always drive to Cleveland. Three Cleveland-bound Detroit fans were killed, along with their chauffeur, south of the Ohio border on Sunday night when their car hit a truck head-on. The driver, described on the front page of the Detroit Free Press as a “new negro” chauffeur, was reportedly speeding. The truck driver and his passenger suffered broken ribs and severe cuts.

The result of the game must have been pleased Schoolboy Rowe, who was correct in his prediction. The American League won, 4-1, before 69,812 fans. Rowe, Bridges, and Cochrane did not play. Gehringer did his typical fine job, going 2-for-3 with a walk. Jimmie Foxx drove in three of the American League’s runs with a home run and a single. Gomez pitched six innings, allowing only three hits, and Mel Harder of Cleveland finished up on the mound.

After the game, many asked for the All-Star vote to be returned to the fans. This did not happen, however, until 1947. As for Lou Gehrig, he went hitless again. Hank Greenberg would not play in an All-Star Game until 1939, the year Gehrig pulled himself out of the Yankee lineup in April, ending his record streak of consecutive games.

This essay was originally published in “Detroit the Unconquerable: The 1935 World Champion Tigers” (SABR, 2014), edited by Scott Ferkovich.

Sources

“3 Detroit Fans Killed with Chauffeur Going to All-Star Baseball Game,” Detroit Free Press, July 8, 1935.

Associated Press, “Dizzy Put Off All-Star Team,” Detroit Free Press, July 6, 1935.

Associated Press, “Frisch Let Off With ‘Warning’ by Dizzy Dean,” Detroit Free Press, July 9, 1935.

Associated Press, “Give Selection Back to Fans, Experts Urge,” Detroit Free Press, July 9, 1935.

Baseball-Reference.com.

Greenberg, Hank, with Ira Berkow, Hank Greenberg: The Story of My Life, (New York: Times Books, 1989).

Ward, Charles P., “General Crowder’s Illness Has Bengals’ Boss Worried,” Detroit Free Press, July 6, 1935.

Ward, Charles P., “Where’s Hank Greenberg? All-Star Game Fans Ask,” Detroit Free Press, July 8, 1935.

At a time when a pint of Kentucky bourbon cost $1.251 and a round-trip train ticket between Chicago and Niagara Falls, the honeymoon capital of the world, cost $8,2 the stars of the Negro Leagues played one of the most dramatic ballgames ever. On a sunny Sunday afternoon in Chicago, 30,000 fans gathered to watch the best black baseball players compete in the third annual East-West Negro League All-Star game. Thirteen future Hall of Famers participated.3 They bore memorable nicknames like Cool Papa, Devil, Mammy, Submarine, Slim, and Turkey; but it was the battle between the Maestro and the Mule that determined the outcome. The fans were treated to an epic contest that featured two comebacks from four-run deficits and culminated in an 11th-inning walk-off home run by the game’s strongest power hitter off the best pitcher not named Satchel Paige.4

An All-Star game featuring black players was the brainchild of A.W. “Gus” Greenlee as a response to the severe anti-black repression that barred black athletes from the major leagues. Dire economic conditions of the 1930s precluded the Negro League World Series between 1928 and 1941,5 thereby making the All-Star Game the premier event for black players to showcase their skills. As noted in an announcement promoting the game, it was a battle between “teams which could enter either the American or National League and show their heels to the leaders.”6

The game, hosted by R.A. Cole, owner of Chicago American Giants, was played in the spacious Baseball Palace of the World, Comiskey Park. When it was built in 1910, the ballpark was the first symmetrical field in the major leagues — 362 feet down the foul lines and 420 feet in center. Designed to blend with the surrounding area, the exterior of Comiskey Park incorporated red brick archways similar to nearby factories. Built of steel and concrete, it was a departure from previous wooden structures. Innovations like turnstiles and ramps, instead of open gates and stairs, helped facilitate the safe flow of fans entering and exiting the facility. On the field, foul lines were old fire hoses pressed flat and painted white. The pitcher’s mound was like a jewel in the center of a diamond-shaped cutout in the infield grass.

In contrast to the major leagues, where sportswriters chose the All-Stars, fans elected the Negro League players using ballots distributed by weekly and daily newspapers and at Negro League games. The East team was chosen from the Brooklyn Eagles, Newark Dodgers, Philadelphia Stars, and New York Cubans. The West team was selected from the Chicago American Giants, Columbus Elite Giants, Pittsburgh Crawfords, and Homestead Grays. The fans cast over 150,000 ballots.7

Webster “Submarine” McDonald managed the East team that included Paul Arnold, Leon Day, Ray Dandridge, Martin Dihigo, Robert Evans, George Giles, Fats Jenkins, Slim Jones, Richard Lundy, Biz Mackey, Alejandro Oms, Dick Seay, Jake Stephens, Ed Stone, Luis Tiant Sr., and Jud Wilson.

Oscar Charleston managed the West team. His players were Cool Papa Bell, Larry Brown, Raymond Brown, William “Sug” Cornelius, James Crutchfield, Josh Gibson, Bob Griffith, Sammy T. Hughes, Buck Leonard, Leroy Matlock, Alex Radcliffe, Ted Trent, Felton “Mammy” Snow, Turkey Stearnes, Mule Suttles, Willie “Devil” Wells, Chester Williams, and Burnis Wright.

Known as The Maestro, Cuban-born Martin Dihigo was a tall, powerful switch-hitter who played every position, including pitcher. “He was the best ballplayer of all time, black or white,” a competitor said.8 In his best season he posted a 0.90 ERA and went 18-2 while hitting a league-leading .387. In addition to being enshrined in the National Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, Dihigo is the only player also inducted in the baseball halls of fame in Cuba, Mexico, the Dominican Republic, and Venezuela. 

George “Mule” Suttles was a gentle giant. He did not seek the limelight like his more famous contemporaries; he let his 50-ounce bat do the talking. Over a 25-year period, Suttles averaged 34 homers and compiled a .327 career batting average. Where Josh Gibson hit vicious line drives, Mule was known for gargantuan blasts. In a game played in Havana, Mule crushed a ball over the center-field fence that witnesses swore cleared the 60-foot-high wall and traveled over the heads of the mounted policemen patrolling outside the ballpark — a distance of 600 feet.9 In a game against the Memphis Red Sox, he hit three homers in the same inning. On this day in 1935, he saved his best for last.

Over the first six innings, the East built a 4-0 lead on the strength of timely hitting, including an RBI single by Dihigo to plate the first run. East pitcher Slim Jones mesmerized the West during his three-inning stint. He helped his cause by blasting a homer into deep right field. His successors on the hill did not fare as well. Leon Day was roughed up for three runs in the home sixth and another in the seventh to tie the score. Lefty Luis Tiant followed Day and held the West until he faltered in the 10th.

Meanwhile, the West’s pitching held until Bob Griffith entered the tie game to pitch a disastrous 10th in which he yielded four runs. His outing would have been much worse without a great shoetop catch by Mule Suttles. With the East’s seemingly commanding lead, fans began to head for the exits.

Their exodus did not last long. In the bottom of the 10th, Luis Tiant Sr. ran into trouble. With one run in and the bases loaded with none out, manager McDonald turned to Dihigo, who stopped the carnage. Fans who returned to their seats were treated to a storybook ending.

In the home 11th, Martin Dihigo made a grievous mistake; he walked Cool Papa Bell, the legendary speedster. The inimitable Satchel Paige once remarked that Bell was so fast that when he switched off the light, he was in bed before the room got dark.10 No doubt both teams recalled how in the All-Star Game a year earlier, Bell had plated the game’s only run by scoring from second base on an infield hit.11 In this game, East catcher Biz Mackey had gunned down three baserunners attempting to steal and picked Ray Dandridge off third to end the West’s threat in the 10th, and manager Charleston signaled for a sacrifice. Hughes executed a bunt perfectly, advancing Bell to scoring position. One down.

As the number-three hitter, Chester Williams approached the plate, Dihigo glanced at the on-deck circle. The imposing figure of Josh Gibson settled onto one knee to watch the confrontation. Gibson had already collected four hits, including a ringing double in the sixth inning that Dihigo tried to catch before crashing into the center-field wall. Whether later in the game Dihigo suffered from the effects of the collision is a matter for conjecture.

The pitcher made quick work of Williams, striking him out. Two down.

In the West’s dugout, Mule counseled the relief pitcher Sug Cornelius.

“Go up there and kneel in the on-deck circle, Cornelius, they’ll think you’re up next.”12

With so many substitutions in an All-Star Game, Suttles counted on confusion in the opposing dugout regarding the proper batting order at this point. As Cornelius hefted a couple of bats in the on-deck circle, Mackey signaled for an intentional walk to Gibson. The walk to Gibson was imperative. Why give one of the greatest batters of all time a chance to win the game when a walk would set up a force play at any base?

As Gibson ambled to first, Suttles emerged from the dugout. The PA announcement crackled over the speakers:

 “Now batting for the West squad, THE MULE!”13

Dihigo shot a contemptuous look at the West’s dugout for the gamesmanship. With two out and two on, Dihigo was confident he could get Mule out. The hometown fans rose to their feet, exhorting the local star with his trademark cheer: “Kick, Mule! Kick, Mule!”

Suttles who had already walked four times, relished the opportunity to hit. In the on-deck circle, Mule swung five bats before entering the batter’s box.

The Maestro was the epitome of determined concentration as he glared toward the plate. After checking the runners, he unleashed a ball that sizzled as it bore in on Mule. Thwapp!

“Inside. Ball one,” shouted the umpire, barely audible over the noisy crowd.

The next pitch was a perfect strike at the letters. Mule nodded, exhaled, and stepped back. He bent, grabbing some dirt to dry his hands. He practiced a half-swing with his fearsome black bat. Settling back in the box, Mule locked his eyes onto the area next to Dihigo’s right ear where the ball would soon appear.

What happened next is best described in a poem entitled “Lament on the East-West Game” that appeared in the Philadelphia Tribune:

The bat met ball, the ball passed the fence
And with it went the East team’s chance
Turn back, oh time, but the deed is done
Mule Suttles’ homer the game has won.
And so, my friends, Mac knows full well
That managing, like war, is hell.14

Notes

1 Chicago Tribune, August 10, 1935: 15.

2 Chicago Tribune, August 5, 1935: 16.

3 Members of the National Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, New York: Cool Papa Bell, Raymond Brown, Oscar Charleston, Ray Dandridge, Leon Day, Martin “The Maestro” Dihigo, Josh Gibson, Buck Leonard, James “Biz” Mackey, Turkey Stearnes, Mule Suttles, Willie “Devil” Wells and Jud Wilson.

4 Instead of attending the East-West All-Star game, Satchel Paige accepted a better monetary offer to play for an integrated team called the Bismarck Churchills and led them to victory in the semipro National Baseball Congress Championship at Wichita, Kansas. nbcbaseball.com/about-us/history/ (retrieved February 4, 2018).

5 Larry Lester, Black Baseball’s National Showcase (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2001), 1. (hereinafter cited as Lester Compilation).

6  “Expect 30,000 at All-Star Game Sunday,” Chicago Defender, August 10, 1935, reproduced in Lester Compilation, 69.

7 “Colored All-Star Nines Meet in East-West Game Today” Chicago Tribune, August 11, 1935: 2, 4.

8 National Baseball Hall of Fame website page for Martin Dihigo. Quote attributed to Buck Leonard baseballhall.org/hof/dihigo-mart%C3%ADn (retrieved February 4, 2018).

9 John B. Holway, Blackball Stars (Westport, Connecticut: Meckler Books, 1988), 267. (hereinafter cited as Holway).

10 William Gildea, “On Today’s Scene: Paige Admits He’s Feeling His Age” Washington Post, April 29, 1969: D2.

11 William G. Nunn, “ ‘Satch’ Stops ‘Big Bad Men’ of West Team,” Pittsburgh Courier, September 1, 1934, reproduced in Lester Compilation, 57.

12 Holway, 276-77.

13 Holway, 270.

14 Ed Harris, Lament on the East-West Game, Philadelphia Tribune, August 29, 1935, reproduced in Lester Compilation, 77.

The reason for the poor turnout – it remains the lowest-ever attendance at an All-Star game – was poor planning. The Bees had announced that they’d sold 17,000 reserved seats and would put the remaining 25,000 unreserved seats on sale the morning of the game. (During the winter the Boston club had changed its name from Braves to Bees. Braves Field was now officially called National League Park, although informally it was known as Bees Field or just the Bee Hive.)

Club president Bob Quinn had said he expected a crowd of about 42,000. Boston club officials notified the public that to reduce congestion on game day, the Babcock Street entrances to the park would be open for the first time. Nevertheless, fans purchased fewer than 9,000 of those unreserved seats. Evidently, Bostonians had decided they didn’t want to wait in what they assumed would be long ticket lines on such a hot day. Of course those lines never materialized, and large portions of the left- and right-field bleachers remained unoccupied. The real victim of the low turnout was the Association of Professional Baseball Players of America, which received 83½ percent of the proceeds from the game.

Although Boston was a two-team city, the crowd was decidedly rooting for the National Leaguers, who as usual were the underdogs. “We admit the American League power at bat, but we’re going to combat it by great pitching, by speed, and by generally tight defense,” said National League manager Charlie Grimm. “And we are not sparing our horses in our effort to win this game.”1 That last sentiment was in line with National League President Ford Frick’s position. Frick, stung by three straight losses, felt that in the last two games his league had not always put its best players on the field.         

Grimm named two starters strictly because of their superior defensive abilities. He started St. Louis’s Leo Durocher at shortstop ahead of Pittsburgh’s Arky Vaughan, the league’s defending batting champion and the fans’ choice, and his own Augie Galan in center, over many other outfielders who received more votes. The leagues had increased the size of the roster from 20 to 21, still, the National League had some surprising omissions. Neither Philadelphia’s Dolph Camilli nor Boston’s Buck Jordan, the top two in the National League batting race, made the team; nor did the eventual batting champion, Pittsburgh’s Paul Waner.2

True to his word not to “spare the horses,” Grimm made only two nonpitching substitutions in the game. Both were in the eighth inning, when Mel Ott batted for right fielder Frank Demaree, and Lew Riggs batted for third baseman Pinky Whitney.       

American League manager Joe McCarthy took a different approach. He said he would try to start the lineup that the fans favored and to play as many men as possible. While Grimm’s strategy worked, it left many Bees fans disgruntled. Wally Berger, their only representative and the starting center fielder in the three previous All-Star games, didn’t get to play. In addition to Galan, Grimm had three more of his Cubs in the starting lineup, along with four players from the Cardinals and one from the Phillies.        

Not surprising for a team that entered the break with a 10-game lead, McCarthy had seven of his Yankees on the squad and easily could have had nine. Red Rolfe, generally considered the league’s best third baseman, wasn’t chosen, and Washington outfielder Ben Chapman had been a Yankee before they’d traded him to the Senators three weeks earlier. McCarthy chose to put just two of his Yankees in the starting lineup: first baseman Lou Gehrig, the league’s leading hitter, and 21-year-old Joe DiMaggio, the first rookie ever to start an All-Star Game. In fact, DiMaggio was the first rookie ever named by either league to its All-Star squad. McCarthy’s selection of Lefty Grove of Boston, the fans’ choice, as his starting pitcher, ended the run of three consecutive starts by his own ace, Lefty Gomez.    

Detroit had repeated as American League pennant-winners in 1935, which would have given the Tigers’ manager, Mickey Cochrane, winner of the 1935 game, the privilege of again managing his league’s entry. However, Cochrane was in Wyoming recuperating from a nervous breakdown, and because the Yankees were in first place and had finished second to the Tigers in 1935, the league named McCarthy to take his place. It was the first All-Star appearance for both McCarthy and Grimm, although they had each led their teams to pennants in 1932. Had it not been for the sentimental choices of Connie Mack and John McGraw, McCarthy and Grimm might have been the managers in the first All-Star Game.        

Grimm picked Dean, the majors’ winningest pitcher at 14-4, to start. Dean responded with an overpowering performance, pitching three hitless innings and not allowing a ball out of the infield. He did walk two batters, but faced just the minimum nine batters as both runners were erased on the basepaths.

Dean got two quick strikes on Luke Appling, the game’s first batter, before walking him. He was retired when DiMaggio bounced into a double play. The crowd had given DiMaggio a big hand when he stepped in, but it would be a very disappointing day for the Yankees’ rookie sensation. He batted five times in this game, each time with one or more runners on base, and failed to get a hit or drive in a run. He also had his problems in the field. His error on a single by Billy Herman in the fifth allowed Herman to take second, drawing some boos from the crowd. Three innings earlier, he’d misplayed into a triple Gabby Hartnett’s low line drive that most observers felt he should have caught, or at worst held to a single. Red Sox manager Joe Cronin, a spectator at the game, said afterwards that DiMaggio had played the ball “a trifle nonchalantly.”3  DiMaggio made no excuses, saying the ball just sunk on him. He also, no doubt, never forgot the criticism.    

Hartnett’s second-inning triple, following a leadoff single by Demaree and preceding Whitney’s scoring fly ball, gave the National League an early two-run lead against Grove. The Nationals added two more in the fifth against Detroit’s Schoolboy Rowe. With one out, Galan, now turned around to bat left-handed, homered off the flagpole in right field. After hitting the pole, which separated fair and foul territory, the ball caromed into foul ground. The American Leaguers protested, claiming it should be a grounds-rule double, the ruling for such hits in many AL parks. The umpires (coincidentally three of whom, Bill Stewart, Beans Reardon, and Bill Summers, were Massachusetts natives) correctly stayed with their ruling of a home run. Herman’s single and advancement to second on DiMaggio’s error followed, and after Collins walked, Joe Medwick scored Herman with a single to left.

Meanwhile, Hubbell, the Giants’ great left-hander, replaced Dean in the fourth and continued the mastery over the American Leaguers he’d shown at the Polo Grounds in 1934. He pitched three more scoreless innings, allowing just two singles and a walk. In the seventh, still leading 4-0, Grimm called on Cubs right-hander Curt Davis to wind it up. Gehrig, hitless in 10 previous All-Star at-bats, greeted him with a long home run to right. Two outs later the Americans loaded the bases on singles by Goose Goslin and Jimmie Foxx and a walk to George Selkirk. Appling’s single to right scored Goslin and Foxx, making the score 4-3 and finishing Davis.

Grimm brought in Lon Warneke, another of his Cubs pitchers, who walked Charlie Gehringer to reload the bases. That brought DiMaggio to the plate with a chance to redeem himself. He didn’t, but only because Durocher was standing in the right place and managed to hold on to a scorching line drive that appeared headed safely to left field. The American Leaguers mounted another rally in the eighth. They had runners at first and third with two out and Foxx at the plate. But Foxx, already immensely popular in his first season in Boston, struck out. A final chance came in the ninth when Gehringer doubled with two outs. Once again DiMaggio came up with a chance to tie the score, but Joe popped weakly to Herman to end the game.  

Sources          

This game account largely comes from Vincent, David, Lyle Spatz, and David W. Smith, The Midsummer Classic: The Complete History of Baseball’s All-Star Game (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2001).

Notes             

1Boston Herald, July 7, 1936, 12.

2 The 21-man rosters consisted of 16 players chosen by the fans and five chosen by the managers. The fans’ 16 comprised included four pitchers, two catchers, five infielders, and five outfielders. The managers could not have more than two pitchers in their five selections.

3Boston Herald, July 8, 1936, 18.

Rumors had circulated earlier in the week that the 1937 All-Star Game might be the last because the novelty of the midsummer contest had worn off.3  An enthusiastic capacity crowd of 31,391 including President Roosevelt and other dignitaries4 seemingly squelched that concern. Dean had manufactured some pregame drama by announcing that he was going to skip the game, go home, and rest a sore arm during the break. But he flew in from St. Louis for the contest, telling reporters that he was just trying to get out of the long train trip and that he knew eventually someone would foot the bill for an airplane ride.5

The All-Star selection process had produced some discord as Commissioner Kenesaw M. Landis and the league presidents disenfranchised the fans and left it up to the two managers, with each having input from the other seven skippers in their respective leagues.6 The stated reason was for the game to be a real test of baseball ability rather than an exhibition of stars.7 Hometown Senators fans became upset when American League manager Joe McCarthy selected the Browns’ Sam West to replace injured Tigers outfielder Gee Walker instead of their own John Stone, who was batting .332 at the break.8 McCarthy apparently didn’t care about the Senators fans’ feelings as he failed to use any of the three Senators who were named to the squad.9 In fact, all eight position starters played the entire game for the Americans.

FDR made his pregame entrance in an open car escorted by a dozen Eagle Scouts and then proceeded to throw out the first pitch from his box seat to a row of players on the third-base line.  After a scramble, Jo-Jo Moore of the Giants emerged with the ball.10 It turned out to be the National League’s only victory of the day.

The pitching matchup was marquee, Dean versus Lefty Gomez, who was starting his fourth All-Star Game, missing only the 1936 game, the one year his league lost. Dean, who was 12-7 at the break, was starting his second game in a row and making his fourth All-Star appearance. Gomez was nearly spotless in his three innings of work, allowing only a first-inning single to Arky Vaughn. Dean, on the other hand, was not as sharp, allowing a walk to Joe DiMaggio in the opening frame and two hard singles in the second to Earl Averill and Bill Dickey before escaping the inning unscathed. In the third, however, he was not as fortunate. After Dean retired Red Rolfe and Charlie Gehringer, DiMaggio sent a line drive past Diz’s ear for a single up the middle. Lou Gehrig then excited the crowd by clobbering the second pitch he saw over the right-field roof, but it went well foul. With the count 3-and-2, Lou smashed another drive over the right-field wall, fair this time, to stake the Americans to a 2-0 lead. Averill then ripped a ball off Dean’s foot. It caromed to second baseman Billy Herman, who threw Earl out at first. Diz limped off the mound and in the clubhouse after the game it was announced that he had suffered a broken toe.11

The National League came back to score a run in the top of the fourth off Tommy Bridges, Gomez’s successor, on a single by Herman, who moved to second on a groundout by Vaughn and crossed the plate on Joe Medwick’s ringing double over third to bring the score to 2-1. It was the first of four hits, including two doubles, for Medwick, who was in the middle of his Triple Crown season.12 He came into the game batting a lusty .404 for the regular season.

Carl Hubbell followed Dean to the mound in the bottom of the fourth but didn’t last the inning, as the American League got back at him for 1934, when King Carl struck out five American League sluggers in succession. With one out, he nearly beaned Dickey on a 3-and-1 count to put a runner on first. West then blasted a shot through Johnny Mize at first to put runners on first and third. Bridges struck out but Red Rolfe of the Yankees tripled to the scoreboard in right-center to drive in two runs. Gehringer followed by singling past Mize to advance the score to 5-1, leading National League manager Bill Terry to remove his ace in favor of Cy Blanton, who fanned DiMaggio on a full count to end the inning.

Gabby Hartnett of the Cubs led off the National’s fifth with a shot through Bridges’ legs for a single. With one out, Mel Ott, pinch-hitting for Blanton, ripped a double off the wall in right-center, sending Hartnett to third. Paul Waner then hit a fly ball to West in right to drive in Hartnett and close the score to 5-2, but despite an error by Rolfe on a hot shot by Herman, the National League could do no more damage. Lee Grissom of the Reds pitched the bottom half for the senior circuit and began impressively, fanning Gehrig and Averill. Joe Cronin and Dickey, however, cracked back-to-back doubles to extend the lead to 6-2. 

The National League still had some fight in them and scored in the sixth on singles by Medwick and Frank Demaree and Mize’s long fly ball to deep center. It could have been worse, but DiMaggio made a terrific throw later in the inning to nail Burgess Whitehead at the plate. Whitehead, running for Hartnett, was attempting to score from second on Ripper Collins’s sharp single to right. 

Once again, the American League countered in its half of the inning, this time against Van Lingle Mungo, to extend its lead to five. Mungo, apparently nursing a sore back, had made the unfortunate boast before the contest that “I can pitch against American Leaguers with a case of paralysis.”13 With one out, he walked Rolfe and surrendered a single to Gehringer, before striking out DiMaggio. Gehrig then worked the count to 3-and-1 before blasting one in front of the bleachers in center to drive in two runs and make the score 8-3. He was out “by an eyelash” trying to stretch a triple on a snappy relay from Demaree to shortstop Dick Bartell to Vaughn.14 

That ended the scoring for the day although the National League did threaten against the junior circuit’s Mel Harder, who pitched the last three innings. The most acute challenge came in the seventh when he allowed a one-out single by Herman and a two-out double by Medwick to put runners on second and third. But Harder erased the threat by inducing Demaree to ground out to Cronin at shortstop. Meanwhile, Mungo and Bucky Walters held the American League at bay in their last two at-bats, although Walters allowed two-out singles to Rolfe and Gehringer before shutting the door.

Although Harder gave up five hits in his three innings on the mound, he extended his All-Star scoreless streak to 13 innings. He would pitch another 10 seasons for the Cleveland Indians, but never would get a chance to extend his record.

Each team collected 13 hits in what really amounted to a slugfest. Ducky Medwick was the hitting star for the Nationals, while Gehringer led the way for the American League with three hits. Yankees batters, however, drove in seven of the eight runs and Lefty Gomez was the winning pitcher, giving him three All-Star Game victories, a record that still stood as of 2019. The New York Times wryly suggested that “perhaps some day they’ll inaugurate a three-cornered all-star struggle, with the Yankees batting as a unit.”15

After the game, Dizzy Dean took responsibility for the home run Gehrig hit off him, saying, “I shook Hartnett off twice and was belted each time. He wanted a curve with Gehrig up there in the third and I shook him off, sending a fast one instead, and Gehrig hit a homer.”16

Dean did not pitch again for two weeks, losing a tight 2-1 game to the Boston Braves on July 21. But he was ineffective after that and appeared in only six more games in the last half of the season. By coming back too soon from his toe injury, he had altered his motion and hurt his arm. He was just 27 but would win only 17 more games in his major-league career. 

On the eve of his induction into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1975, Earl Averill said, “I batted .378 in 1936. I got over 2,000 hits in my career. But the thing I’ll always be most remembered for is breaking a guy’s toe.”17

Sources

In addition to the sources cited in the Notes, the author accessed Retrosheet.org, Baseball-Reference.com, and SABR.org.

Notes 

1 James P. Dawson, “All-Star Park’s Capacity Forces Return of $125,000 Ticket Bids,” New York Times, July 7, 1937: 29.

2 David Vincent, Lyle Spatz, and David W. Smith, The MidSummer Classic: The Complete History of Baseball’s All-Star Game (Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2001), 28.

3 Vincent et al., 28.

4 They included FDR’s eldest son, James, Postmaster General Jim Farley, WPA Administrator Harry Hopkins, and the chair of the Reconstruction Finance Corporation, Jesse Jones. “Roosevelt Cheers Americans’ Victory,” New York Times, July 8, 1937: 27.

5 John Drebinger, “All-Star Teams Rated Even in Game at Washington, Baseball Capital for a Day,” New York Times, July 7, 1937: 29; Vincent et al., 28-29.

6 Drebinger.

7 Vincent et al., 28.

8 West was hitting .347 but Stone’s batting average was higher than those of three of the outfielders chosen.

9 They were infielder Buddy Myer, pitcher Wes Ferrell, and his brother, catcher Rick Ferrell. 

10 “Roosevelt Cheers Americans’ Victory.”

11 Donald Honig, The All-Star Game – A Pictorial History to Present (St. Louis: The Sporting News Publishing Company, 1987), 28.

12 All four hits were line drives. John Drebinger, “Yankees Drive in Seven Runs as American League Easily Wins All-Star Game,” New York Times, July 8, 1937: 27.

13 Drebinger, “All-Star Teams Rated Even in Game at Washingtion,”:27; Vincent, et.al.,29.

14 James P. Dawson, “Play-by-Play Account of Battle Between Big Leagues at Capital,” New York Times, July 8, 1937: 27.

15 Drebinger, “Yankees Drive in Seven Runs as American League Easily Wins All-Star Game,”:27.

16 “Dean Is Made Butt of Winners’ Jibes,” New York Times, July 8, 1937: 27.

17 Honig, 29. 

Johnny Vander Meer

This game was an important one for the NL and possibly for the future of the All-Star Game. The NL had lost four of the first five games, contributing to rumors that major-league owners were eager to end the midsummer contest. Owners were said to be unhappy about releasing players for a game that risked player injury and offered no financial rewards for the owners. Profits went to the players’ association fund that provided financial assistance to former ballplayers rather than the owners.

Vander Meer played a central role in driving interest for the game, as Cincinnati fans were eager to see him face the sluggers in the AL lineup. Terry would manage an NL squad featuring 18 changes from 1937, including Vander Meer. Chicago’s Billy Herman and St. Louis’s Joe Medwick were the only repeat starters as the NL sought to improve results. By contrast, the American League lineup featured six holdover starters from the previous year’s 8-3 win at Washington’s Griffith Stadium. For AL and Yankees manager Joe McCarthy, however, the game was “a headache.”1 McCarthy received blame for some players not being selected; Indians first baseman Hal Trosky was incensed when passed over as an injury replacement for Hank Greenberg in favor of Yankees reliever Johnny Murphy.2 McCarthy selected another Yankees pitcher, Lefty Gomez, to start. Gomez came to Cincinnati with a middling 6-8 record and 4.13 ERA, but he had been selected for all prior All-Star Games and was the winning pitcher in 1937.

Mike Kreevich led off for the AL against Vander Meer, and the White Sox outfielder lofted a fly ball into the outfield. The Giants’ Mel Ott, playing center field, misjudged the ball at first but recovered to make a “fine back-to-the-stands catch.”3 Detroit’s Charlie Gehringer and Cleveland’s Earl Averill grounded out to end the top of the first. The NL opened the scoring in the bottom half, and the AL’s fielding deficiencies were on early display. The Cubs’ Stan Hack led off with a bullet into left field for a single. Herman, his Chicago teammate, grounded toward shortstop Joe Cronin. The Red Sox player-manager booted the ball through his legs and into center field. Reds partisans let out expectant cheers as Cincinnati’s Ival Goodman headed to the plate with runners at the corners and none out. The cheers turned to groans when Goodman struck out looking. Medwick’s long liner to Averill in center field scored Hack for a 1-0 lead, and Ott ended the inning by flying out to Averill.

Neither team got the ball out of the infield in the second inning though Vander Meer earned wild applause for striking out Red Sox slugger Jimmie Foxx. Only Cronin could blemish Vander Meer’s pitching line with a drive down the left-field line to open the third, but his AL teammates stranded him. The Reds had paid for Vander Meer’s parents to travel from New Jersey for the game,4 and they were present to hear raucous cheering when their son exited the game after the third.

The Cubs’ Bill Lee replaced Vander Meer for the middle innings. Lee walked Gehringer on five pitches to start the fourth, but settled down. Averill flied out to Medwick in left field before Foxx’s groundball forced Gehringer at second base. When the Yankees’ Joe DiMaggio took a breaking ball for the third strike, cheers erupted as Lee walked to the dugout.5 For the NL fourth, Gomez gave way to Cleveland’s Johnny Allen but the senior circuit doubled its advantage. With one out, Ott sliced a drive that “hit the low barrier in front of the bleachers in right center field and bounded back halfway to second before Averill ran it down.”6 Ott scored easily from third base for a 2-0 lead when Ernie Lombardi singled into left field. Cincinnati’s Frank McCormick grounded out and Brooklyn’s Leo Durocher struck out to end the fourth.

Yankees catcher Bill Dickey led off the AL fifth and reached base when Durocher lost his popup in the midday sun for a resulting double. After Cronin flied out to Ott, McCarthy elected to have Lou Gehrig pinch-hit for Washington’s Buddy Lewis. Gehrig grounded out to Herman, but remained in the game at first base with Foxx making way by assuming third-base duties from Lewis.

Lee matched Vander Meer’s three scoreless innings, inducing groundouts from Boston’s Doc Cramer and Gehringer before striking out Averill in the AL sixth. Opening the NL sixth, home-plate umpire Bill Klem awarded Goodman first base on a disputed hit-by-pitch. Medwick flied out to DiMaggio in right field for the first out. With Ott batting, Goodman took off for second base. Dickey’s throw missed its mark and ended up in center field, allowing Goodman to claim third base, too. He was stranded there when Ott struck out and Lombardi grounded to Cronin.

Terry called upon Pirates relief specialist Mace Brown to pitch the seventh, a mild surprise as many expected the Giants’ Carl Hubbell to take the mound. Foxx singled when his ball deflected off shortstop Durocher’s glove, but DiMaggio’s grounder forced Foxx at second. Following Dickey’s popup, DiMaggio stole second with Cronin batting. Cronin reached on a four-pitch walk, then Gehrig beat Durocher’s throw for an infield single. With the bases loaded and two out, McCarthy called upon Tigers slugger Rudy York to hit for Allen. York worked the count full against Brown as tension quieted the ballpark. Even though Brown said after the game that his curveball had not worked as he wanted,7 it was a low outside curve at which York swung and missed to end the inning.

The NL took advantage of more madcap AL fielding to double its lead in the bottom of the frame. Red Sox veteran Lefty Grove assumed pitching duties for the AL, and McCormick welcomed Grove by smacking a single into center field. Durocher put down a bunt intended to advance McCormick. Foxx charged for the ball, but so did Gehrig. Gehringer attempted to cover first base, but did not arrive in time for Foxx’s throw. Instead, Foxx’s bullet crashed into the right-field bullpen, scattering the AL pitching staff before rebounding into fair ground. McCormick crossed the plate and Durocher tore around the bases as DiMaggio rushed after the baseball. Trying to nab Durocher at the plate, DiMaggio fired the ball over Dickey’s head, allowing another run. Fuming, Grove struck out Brown, Hack, and Herman in succession, but the damage was done. The NL led, 4-0.

A scoreless eighth inning left the AL with three outs to salvage the contest. DiMaggio’s leadoff line drive into left field for a single was a prelude to the defensive play of the game. Dickey crushed Brown’s pitch toward deep left-center field. Medwick raced toward the ball, ascended the embankment near the fence, and turned and leaped to make a “dazzling, one-handed tumbling catch.”8 Medwick raised his glove to reveal that he caught the ball, bringing the crowd to its feet. Playing closer to the foul line with Cronin up, Medwick was unable to repeat his fielding heroics when Cronin drove the ball almost to the same spot. The ball rebounded off the wall for an RBI double as DiMaggio slid home. Gehrig smacked Brown’s offering into deep right field, but Goodman made the catch against the bleachers. With AL batters driving Brown’s pitches deep into the outfield, Terry had Hubbell warming up in the bullpen. Down to his last out, McCarthy tapped the Athletics’ Bob Johnson to pinch-hit for Grove. Johnson battled to extend the game but “after keeping tension going as long as he could, took a third strike and the conflict was over.”9

With his performance continuing his successful summer, Vander Meer acted the part of the modest rookie after the game, collecting autographs from teammates with a sheepish approach to veterans.10 Terry delighted in the win, cackling, “Maybe we won’t get so much criticism now; the minor league won one.”11 McCarthy accepted the defeat in stride. “It was their day, that’s all, and it was a good ball game,” he said.12 Whether an irritant or not, the owners announced in Cincinnati that Yankee Stadium would be the site of next year’s game in connection with the 1939 World’s Fair. With the crowd of 27,067 contributing to gate receipts exceeding $38,000, the Ball Players’ Benevolent Fund would receive a sizable contribution.

This article was published in “Cincinnati’s Crosley Field: A Gem in the Queen City” (SABR, 2018), edited by Gregory H. Wolf. To read more articles from this book at the SABR Games Project, click here.

Sources

In addition to the sources cited in the Notes, the author also consulted:

baseball-reference.com.

retrosheet.org.

Cincinnati Enquirer, July 2-8, 1938, various articles.

The Sporting News, July 7 and 14, 1938.

Notes

1 Bob Considine, “McCarthy Beefs Over Big Game; Too Much Work,” Cincinnati Enquirer, July 5, 1938: 12.

2 Trosky delighted in the AL defeat, saying, “It served them right. . . Look at Gehrig. He hasn’t been hitting a lick all season and they name him to the All-Star lineup just because he has played in some 2,500 games. … They think they owe it to him.” “Scalpers,” Cincinnati Enquirer, July 8, 1938: 2.

3 Lou Smith, “National Team Takes All-Star Honors, 4-1; Vandy and Three Red Mates in Limelight,” Cincinnati Enquirer, July 7, 1938: 1, 14.

4 “Home Folks Cheer for Vander Meer,” New York Times, July 7, 1938: 14.

5 Lou Smith.

6 “Home Folks.”

7 Dick Farrington, “Medwick Catch Deciding Factor in National League All-Star Win; Strategy of McCarthy Criticized,” The Sporting News, July 14, 1938: 5.

8 Alan Gould, “Gomez Is Charged With His First Defeat in All-Star Play,” Cincinnati Enquirer, July 7, 1938: 11.

9 John Drebinger, “Effective Pitching and American League Errors Carry Nationals to Victory,” New York Times, July 7, 1938: 14.

10 “Pilot Terry Had Nervous Moment When Rudy York Strode to Plate,” New York Times, July 7, 1938: 15.

11 Ibid.

12 Ibid.

Yankee Stadium was the natural choice to hold the All-Star Game in 1939. The game originated in Chicago in 1933, as an activity adjacent to the city’s Century of Progress World’s Fair. Six years later, New York was home to another World’s Fair, touting “The World of Tomorrow.” Companies like Westinghouse and National Cash Register showed off their newest, state-of-the-art products, and industrial engineer Norman Bel Geddes touted his Futurama, a city from the far-off future in 1960, a world where elevated highways and transcontinental flights were not just possible but part of everyday life.1 Even baseball got into the act, with an Academy of Sport at the fair. In anticipation of the fair, Uniforms for New York City’s three teams, the Brooklyn Dodgers, New York Giants, and New York Yankees, included a minimalist patch with the Fair’s logo of the Trylon and Perisphere buildings in 1938.2

Because of the opportunity to showcase the city, Yankee Stadium was picked to host the 1939 midseason classic, just five years after the Polo Grounds hosted the second All-Star Game, in 1934.3 It was the second newest venue in baseball (only the Indians’ part-time home, Cleveland Stadium, had been built more recently, opening in 1931), but it was the culmination of an early ballpark-building boom, as steel and concrete edifices supplanted rickety wood structures.

As the most ostentatious new ballpark in America’s biggest city, Yankee Stadium almost immediately became the center of the sports universe. It hosted prizefights. It hosted football games. And because its opening came not long after the debut of Babe Ruth as a Yankee – and the same year another Yankee legend, Lou Gehrig, made his major-league debut – it became home to a lot of championship teams. The Yankees won their first World Series in 1923, the year the stadium opened, and six more before the 1939 season, including the previous three.

By then, the tradition was in place that the managers of the previous year’s World Series teams would manage the All-Star squads. The Cubs’ Gabby Hartnett led the National League squad, but because it was the “centennial” year for baseball,4 Athletics manager Connie Mack, an inductee into the National Baseball Hall of Fame that had opened earlier that summer in Cooperstown, New York, was chosen as the American League manager.5 Ultimately, Mack begged off due to health issues, and the job fell back to Joe McCarthy, who’d managed each of the previous three All-Star squads.6

Ticket prices were the same for the All-Star Game as for any other Yankees game,7 which seemed appropriate; in many ways, it was a Yankees home game. McCarthy managed, and his coaching staff included Art Fletcher, who served as assistant to McCarthy as well as his predecessor, Miller Huggins. And no fewer than nine Yankees were named to the American League team, which made sense, given that the team was out to so far a lead that New York oddsmaker Jack Doyle had considered it a foregone conclusion that they’d win the pennant, offering odds only on who would finish second.8

Gehrig was one of the Yankees named to the American League team (he’d been named to the previous six as well), but he would not be playing. In fact, his retirement was announced the month before, and just a week before the All-Star Game, he was honored between games of an Independence Day doubleheader at the Stadium, telling fans, “Today, I consider myself the luckiest man on the face of the earth.”

Gehrig delivered the American League lineup card to the umpires and received the loudest cheers of the day. It was one of his final appearances in a Yankees uniform, and his ailment was noticeable. “Gehrig walks with a distinct limp,” said Cleveland Plain Dealer sports editor Gordon Cobbledick. “It is not the limp of an injured athlete. It is the halting, jerky limp of a cripple.”9

The only non-Yankees in the starting lineup were the Tigers’ Hank Greenberg, replacing Gehrig at first base, and Red Sox shortstop Joe Cronin and right fielder Doc Cramer. Red Rolfe started at third base, Joe DiMaggio was in center field, George Selkirk was in left field, Joe Gordon was at second, and Red Ruffing was pitching to Bill Dickey.10

Scoring started in the top of the third. Pirates shortstop Arky Vaughan led off the inning and singled for the National Leaguers. Paul Derringer hit two foul balls in an effort to sacrifice and advance Vaughan, but struck out swinging. Stan Hack hit a bloop that fell in in shallow left field to advance Vaughan to second. Lonny Frey then hammered a double over first base into right field, scoring Vaughan. Ival Goodman was intentionally walked to load the bases. Frank McCormick struck out on three pitches, and Ernie Lombardi flied out to end the threat.

In the bottom of the fourth, Derringer had been relieved by Cubs pitcher Bill Lee.11 With two on and two out, Selkirk hit a ball to right field. Goodman laid out but couldn’t make the catch, and Dickey scored to even up the game. The next batter, Gordon, hit a line drive to Vaughan, which he muffed, allowing Greenberg to score. Tommy Bridges struck out looking to end the inning. In the bottom of the fifth, the American League added an insurance run when DiMaggio hit a towering home run to left field with two outs.

The American Leaguers found themselves in a bind in the sixth inning. McCormick led off the frame with a groundout to Gordon. Lombardi singled to left-center on the very next pitch. Joe Medwick hit a roller to Cronin, who was too eager to turn a double play on the slow-footed Lombardi. Cronin booted the ball, leaving Medwick and Lombardi on first and second. Mel Ott hit a single that was batted down just past the infield dirt by Gordon, keeping a run from scoring.

In the Yankee Stadium bullpen, Bob Feller was warming up. He was planning to relieve Bridges in the seventh, but McCarthy called him in earlier. Not yet 21, the Indians pitcher had already shown himself to be one of the supreme hurlers of the day. Indeed, this was already his second All-Star Game appearance. And he was going to bring the heat.

“The best thing I could do was come overhand and throw him a fastball, which I did,” Feller recalled in a 2008 interview.12 And Vaughan hit it right to Gordon, who shoveled it to Cronin for the force at second. Cronin then fired to Greenberg for the double play to get out of the jam.

Feller dominated the rest of the way, earning the save. The first batter of the seventh inning, Babe Phelps, who pinch-hit for Lee, took a pitch – and demanded to see the ball, believing it was doctored!13 Vaughan had one more chance at Feller, in the ninth inning with Ott on first, but he popped out to DiMaggio.

“It is no trick whatever to pick out the All-Star goat,” Tommy Holmes wrote in the next day’s Brooklyn Eagle. It was Arky Vaughan. “This was the first time the Pittsburgh shortstop ever saw the Yankee Stadium. He’ll see it in a hundred nightmares from now on.”14

Feller struck out pinch-hitter Johnny Mize with a curveball that “looked like an aspirin tablet that rolled off a table,”15 and with a full count, struck out Hack looking to end the game.16

“Nice work all around, fellers,” McCarthy said after the game. “It was a good ball game. We got our share of the breaks and capitalized on them.”17

Sources

In addition to the sources cited in the Notes, the author consulted Baseball-Reference.com and Retrosheet.org for pertinent information, including box scores.

https://www.baseball-reference.com/allstar/1939-allstar-game.shtml

https://www.retrosheet.org/boxesetc/1939/B07110ALS1939.htm

Photo credit: SABR-Rucker Archive.

Notes

1 Bel Geddes later designed a state-of-the-art domed ballpark in Brooklyn for the Dodgers. Obviously, it was never built.

2 “Baseball Clubs to Advertise Fair,” Brooklyn Daily Eagle, April 4, 1938: 14.

3 Frederick G. Lieb, “Victory Gives American League Five-to-Two Edge Over National in ‘Dream Game’ Competition,” The Sporting News, July 13, 1939: 5.

4 The 1939 season was celebrated as baseball’s centennial year, with all players wearing a patch on their uniform commemorating it. It was based on the finding – later disproven – that Abner Doubleday invented the game on the fields of Cooperstown a century earlier. Further reading: John Thorn, “Baseball in 25 Objects: The 1939 Sleeve Patch,” https://ourgame.mlblogs.com/the-1939-centennial-sleeve-patch-e3d8ca0f4e65.

5 “Mack Made Manager for All-Star Game,” New York Times, June 2, 1939: 37.

6 McCarthy and the Yankees had won the previous three World Series, and McCarthy filled in as manager in place of the Tigers’ Mickey Cochrane in 1936. “McCarthy to Lead All-Star Team; Mack, Ill, Gives Up Job,” New York Times, July 2, 1939: S1.

7 $2.20 for box seats; $1.65, reserved grandstand; $1.10, unreserved grandstand; and bleacher seats were 55 cents.

8 “American All-Stars Favored at 9 to 20,” New York Times, July 7, 1939: 21.

9 Gordon Cobbledick, “Plain Dealing,” Cleveland Plain Dealer, July 12, 1939: 15. Cobbledick described Gehrig’s ailment as “a form of chronic infantile paralysis.”

10 By comparison, the Reds, leading the National League race at the time, started five players, pitcher Paul Derringer, second baseman Lonny Frey, first baseman Frank McCormick, catcher Ernie Lombardi, and right fielder Ival Goodman. John Drebinger, “Six Yanks to Start for Favored American Leaguers Today,” New York Times, July 11, 1939: 12.

11 Rules of the day limited pitchers to three innings in the All-Star Game; similarly, in the top of the inning, the Tigers’ Tommy Bridges had come on to pitch. “Mack Made Manager for All-Star Game.”

12 Jack Curry, “Going Back, Back, Back to ’39 All-Star Game at the Stadium,” New York Times, June 23, 2008: D1. At the time, Feller and Frey were the only players still living from the game.

13 Tommy Holmes, “NL Beaten but Not Disgraced as Arky Vaughan Sprouts Horns,” Brooklyn Eagle, July 12, 1939: 14.

14 “NL Beaten but Not Disgraced as Arky Vaughan Sprouts Horns.”

15 “NL Beaten but Not Disgraced as Arky Vaughan Sprouts Horns.”

16 Technically, Feller had violated the rules by pitching more than three innings, but accountability on this issue varies. In his autobiography, Feller notes that National Leaguers “cried foul” and in the 2008 Times story, said Hartnett protested but was told to return to the dugout. But the Times game story from the next day says no protest was lodged, noting that “[t]he National Leaguers always had insisted they could pin Feller’s ears back any time they met.”

17 Associated Press, “Harridge Helps in Pummeling of Hero Bob Feller,” Cleveland Plain Dealer, July 12, 1939: 15.