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The older brother of a similarly short-tenured major leaguer, Frank Bell was a 10-game catcher/utilityman for the 1885 Brooklyn Grays of the American Association. Bell was out of baseball several years after his brief big-league audition and working in security when his life came to an abrupt end at age 28. He was fatally shot […]

The light-hitting, 5-foot-6 shortstop William Benjamin Fuller parlayed his excellent fielding into a nine-year career in the majors (1888-1896), beginning with a 49-game stint with the National League’s Washington Nationals. In 1889 he began a seven-year stretch as a starting shortstop, first with the American Association’s St. Louis Browns and then later back in the […]

Outfielder Charlie Frisbee was a switch-hitter who threw right-handed. His first year in the minors was as a catcher, but then he took up work in the outfield. He played two seasons in the majors, in the National League for the Boston Beaneaters in 1899 and for the New York Giants in 1900. After leaving […]

George Scott’s professional baseball career spanned 41 years beginning in Class-D ball at Olean of the New York-Penn League in 1962. His travels were highlighted by his 14 seasons in the majors, starting with the Boston Red Sox in 1966. Scott also played for Milwaukee 1972-1976, Boston 1977-1978, and split his final year between Boston, […]

Jack Matchett made his debut with the Kansas City Monarchs in Memphis on May 12, 1940; he shut out the Birmingham Black Barons.1 In 1942, when the Monarchs swept the Homestead Grays in the best-of-seven Negro Leagues World Series, Matchett won Games One and Three. The first game was a two-hit shutout. He was one […]

Wealthy and able, Edwin A. McAlpin was a man of many interests: family, commerce, Republican Party politics, the New York State National Guard, the Presbyterian Church, and the American Boy Scouts (an early rival of the Boy Scouts of America). For a relatively brief period beginning in 1889, McAlpin also took an active part in […]

“Wish we had him. He is not colored.”1 Those were the words that Frank Bancroft, the Cincinnati Reds’ business manager, wrote to team president and National Commission Chairman Garry Herrmann in 1911 about Rafael Almeida. The Reds were in the midst of acquiring Almeida and fellow Cuban player Armando Marsans, and, as the first two […]

Throughout baseball history, careers have often been defined by a specific play or events. Joe DiMaggio is recalled for his 56-game hitting streak; Willie Mays for his catch in the 1954 World Series. Likewise, players can be maligned for ineptitude, real or perceived. Fred Merkle’s race-altering baserunning gaffe in 1908 and Bill Buckner’s inability to […]

Sam Nahem was a so-so pitcher who logged a 10–8 won-loss record and a 4.69 ERA in four partial seasons with the Dodgers, Cardinals, and Phillies between 1938 and 1948. Despite this unremarkable record, Nahem was a remarkable major leaguer in many ways. He was the only Syrian and one of the few Jews in […]

James Lee “Jimmie” Newberry was a starting pitcher for the Birmingham Black Barons from 1942 to 1950. Most newspapers and historical sources refer to “Jimmy” as the diminutive of Newberry’s first name. However, the best evidence, which includes two autographs, signed “Jimmie Newberry,” is that he preferred to use the variant “Jimmie.”1 Newberry was born […]

Major-league pitcher and umpire J. Harry Colliflower was born on March 11, 1869, in Petersville, Maryland. His first name was the same as his father’s: James, a carpenter. His mother was Catherine Cramer Colliflower. The family was reasonably well-off; they had a domestic living with them at the time of the 1870 U.S. census. There […]

One of the first tragic figures in major-league baseball, Charles Ferguson might have become one of the greatest players of all time had it not been for his untimely death at the age of 25. An all-around natural athlete who starred for the Philadelphia Quakers of the National League from 1884 through 1887, Ferguson had a […]

During World War II, the Kansas City Monarchs had two middle infielders who hit for average, exhibited extra-base power, and played defense with flair. Born in the winter of 1919, Jackie Robinson not only changed baseball history but altered US history as well. Born in the winter of 1920, Bonnie Serrell toiled in a far […]

He terrorized teammates with snakes. He tossed firecrackers under benches and into bullpens. He was a master of the fine art of the hotfoot. Often forgotten is that Moe Drabowsky could pitch a little, too. In a 17-year major-league career with eight teams, it was his two stints with the Orioles that brought him lasting […]

More than anything, Ben Chapman is remembered these days for the vitriol he heaped on Jackie Robinson in April of Robinson’s first year in the majors. Chapman was the Phillies’ manager that day in 1947 and “decided to make Robinson’s color an issue and encouraged at least three of his men to do the same.”1 […]

When the San Francisco Giants took the field at Candlestick Park on Friday, October 1, 1965, their season was hanging in the balance, and precariously so. The Giants trailed the first-place Los Angeles Dodgers by two games with only three games left in the season. Just a week and a half before, on September 20, the Giants had enjoyed […]

Mike Schmidt began 1987 needing five home runs for admission to baseball’s 500-home-run club. On a sunny April afternoon in Pittsburgh, he punched his ticket with a ninth-inning game-winner, rescuing the Phillies from collapse and sinking a Pirates’ comeback. Already entrenched among the game’s all-time greats,1 Schmidt bolstered his legend in 1986 by posting a […]

After winning the World Series in 1946, the St. Louis Cardinals had two straight second-place finishes and in 1949 were trying to capture the National League pennant once again.1 With five games to play in the season, the first-place Cardinals held a 1½-game lead over the second-place Brooklyn Dodgers. The Cardinals had just swept a […]

The 1945 East-West Game at Comiskey Park in Chicago was the 15th installment of the popular matchup between the best players of the Negro American League and Negro National League. For the first half of the season, however, the possibility of the game was in doubt. World War II was still raging, and even though […]

In a distinguished career as a player, coach, and scout – a career that began during the presidency of Herbert Hoover and ended under Gerald Ford – Wally Moses probably saw just about everything that can happen on a baseball diamond at least once. One of the rarest events he ever witnessed – and a […]

The 31,278 fans who came through the turnstiles at Ebbets Field on July 30, 1948, saw something to always remember from the unlikeliest of hitters. Pittsburgh’s Wally Westlake hit for the cycle against the Brooklyn Dodgers.1 Westlake had gone 2-for-24 (two singles) in his previous seven games, a stretch that had seen his batting average […]

Despite five straight World Series titles, Casey Stengel had yet to manage the American League to an All-Star Game victory when he set his lineup at Cleveland Municipal Stadium on July 13, 1954. Stengel ended his midseason drought this hot afternoon as the AL stopped a four-game NL winning streak in a record-setting slugfest. “They’ll […]

Two and a half years after Ernie Banks integrated the Chicago Cubs in September 1953, Banks and four other Black players played key roles in the Cubs’ 12-1 victory over the Cincinnati Redlegs in Chicago’s 1956 home opener.1  At a time when only 1 of 15 major-league players was Black,2 Cubs shortstop Banks, left fielder […]

With a 100-54 won-lost record, the Montreal Royals finished the 1946 regular season in first place in the International League, 18½ games ahead of the second-place Syracuse Chiefs. The Royals were affiliated with the Brooklyn Dodgers and were managed by Clay Hopper. The most sensational player in the league was Jackie Robinson, the Royals second […]