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“Was Simon Nicholls a typical turn-of-the-century player? Maybe not, but he certainly represented an overlooked contributor to the era: the well-mannered college grad. If you take into account the proportion of the total population that went to college back in those days I think it’s pretty clear that we had more than our share of […]

One hundred years ago on Thursday, September 2, 1880, teams representing two of Boston’s prominent department stores, Jordan Marsh and Company and R. H. White and Company, played a game of baseball at Nantasket Bay on the oceanside of Hull, Massachusetts. This game would have held no historic value and would long since have been […]

September 28, 1941. Shibe Park, Philadelphia. The Red Sox split a Sunday doubleheader with Connie Mack’s Athletics on the final day of the 1941 season. These were meaningless games in the standings; the Red Sox were in second place but 17 1/2 games behind the Yankees and the Athletics were dead last, 37 1/2 games […]

Baker Bowl it was a wonderful place! More action probably took place on those Philadelphia grounds than at any other athletic facility in our country. For half a century the place was packed with action. There was major league baseball, championship boxing and wrestling, and professional football — say nothing of such extra-curricular activities as […]

A wag once wrote a history of the Philadelphia Phillies and entitled it “One Hundred Years in the Cellar.” He was not far off the mark. In fact, in the first seven decades after the Phillies entered the National League in 1883, save for two brief periods of success in the 1890s and the mid-teens […]

Publicity photo issued by Philco. Connie Mack (center) and Boake Carter (right) are shown conducting the interview. Note the television camera and how primitive it is by today’s standards.   Baseball’s relationship with the media can be traced back to the earliest days of the game. It started with newspapers in the nineteenth century, broadened […]

  With Connie Mack’s election as president of the Athletics in January 1937, the Mack family now controlled all of the senior leadership positions in the club’s front office. From left: Earle, Connie, and Roy Mack in 1937. (Courtesy of Robert D. Warrington)   The outlook wasn’t brilliant for the Philadelphia Athletics in 1954. In […]

He was known as “The Tall Tactician” and was baseball’s grand old gentleman for more than a generation. Statuesque, stately, and slim, he clutched a rolled-up scorecard as he sat or stood ramrod straight in the dugout, attired in a business suit rather than a uniform, a derby or bowler in place of a baseball […]

As a franchise that began 130 years ago, the Philadelphia Phillies have made an indelible mark not only on the city where they play but also on the whole sport of baseball. This is a team that has maintained the same name longer than any other team in professional sports. And with some of the […]

The 1939 Yankees are known as one of the greatest teams of all time. They were an outstanding squad, finishing 17 games ahead of the second-place Boston Red Sox and winning the AL pennant in a breeze. Sportswriters of the day referred to the 1939 American League as the Yankees and the seven dwarves. The […]