What is the story about?
Free
of charge for the discerning reader. Happy birthday to King Cole and a mighty host of others, plus more baseball stories, like the Babe turning into THE Babe, Jackie Robinson debut, Hank’s first hit, and California baseball.
Today in baseball history:
- 1911 – At the age of 24, Grover Cleveland Alexander makes his major league debut, losing a 5-4 decision to the Rustlers on an unearned run in the tenth inning at Boston’s South End Grounds.
- 1915 – Rube Marquard of the New York Giants no-hits the Brooklyn Robins, winning, 2 – 0.
- 1918 – The American League season opens with Babe Ruth pitching a four-hit, 7 – 1, victory over the Philadelphia Athletics. Boston Red Sox manager Ed Barrow will start Ruth’s conversion to slugger later that season by working him into 72 games in the outfield and at first base.
- 1947 – 28-year-old Jackie Robinson makes a historic debut for the Brooklyn Dodgers, becoming the first African-American to play in either the National League or the American League in the 20th century. Robinson goes 0 for 3 in his debut, but scores the deciding run in a 5 – 3 victory over the Boston Braves at Ebbets Field. He handles 11 chances at first base, a new position for him. Robinson is the first black player to appear in a predominantly white major league since 1884.
- 1954 – Hank Aaron collects the first hit of his major league career. The Milwaukee Braves‘ rookie goes 2 for 5 in a 7 – 6 win over the St. Louis Cardinals.
- 1958 – Major League Baseball comes to California as the transplanted Giants and Dodgers play the first game on the Pacific Coast. The Californian contest at San Francisco’s Seals Stadium sees Ruben Gómez blanking Los Angeles and Don Drysdale. Daryl Spencer hits the first home run and Orlando Cepeda also homers in the Giants’ 8-0 victory in front of 23,448 fans.
- 2000 – In the 2,800th game of his career, Baltimore Orioles infielder Cal Ripken, Jr. lines a base hit off Minnesota Twins pitcher Hector Carrasco to become the 24th major leaguer to reach the 3,000 career hit milestone. The single also makes Ripken only the seventh player to get 3,000 hits and 400 home runs in major league history.
- 2009 – Ian Kinsler of the Texas Rangers goes 6 for 6 and hits for the cycle in a 19 – 6 win over the Baltimore Orioles. It had been 119 years since Farmer Weaver had been the last big leaguer to go 6 for 6 and hit for the cycle in a nine-inning game.
- 2009 – On a night of milestones in Seattle, Ken Griffey hits his 400th home run as a Mariner – the 613th long ball of his career – and Ichiro Suzuki hits a grand slam off Jason Bulger for his 3,085th hit as a professional, tying the Japanese record held by Isao Harimoto.
Cubs Birthdays: Trey Wingenter, Milton Bradley, Jeromy Burnitz, Mike Diaz, Ted Sizemore, Ed Bailey, King Cole*, Elmer Sutcliffe.
Today in history:
- 1493 –Christopher Columbus is received by the Spanish monarchs Isabella I and Ferdinand II in Barcelona upon his return from the New World. Columbus presents kidnapped Taínos indigenous people, plants and items collected from the Caribbean.
- 1862 – American poet Emily Dickinson first corresponds with author and future literary mentor Thomas Wentworth Higginson, a relationship that lasts the rest of her life.
- 1874 – First Impressionist art exhibition opens in Paris, features Claude Monet, Edgar Degas, Pierre-Auguste Renoir, Camille Pissarro and Berthe Morisot.
- 1877 – World’s first home telephone is installed in Somerville, Massachusetts at the house of Charles Williams Jr.
- 1892 – General Electric Company formed by merger of Thomas Edison‘s General Electric Company with Thomson-Houston Electric Company, arranged by J. P. Morgan and incorporated in NY.
- 1948 – F. H. Thornton observes a flash of light in crater Plato on the Moon.
- 1955 – Ray Kroc opens the first McDonald’s Inc. fast food restaurant in Des Plaines, Illinois.
- 2010 -Volcanic ash from the eruption of Eyjafjallajökull in Iceland leads to the closure of airspace over most of Europe.
*pictured.
