A M-W-F digest, replete with #Cubs, #MLB, and #MiLB content, gathered from reputable sources. Alec Mills’ finest hour, and more!
On Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, Bleed Cubbie Blue is pleased to present a light-hearted, Cubs-centric look at baseball’s colorful past, with plenty of the lore and various narratives to follow as they unfold over the course of time. Here’s a handy Cubs timeline, to help you follow along.
“Maybe I called it wrong, but it’s official.” — Tom Connolly.
Today in baseball history:
- 1845 – Alexander Cartwright presents the first set of baseball rules, 20 in total. (2)
- 1883 – Cleveland’s one-arm pitcher Hugh Daily no-hits Philadelphia, 1-0. (2)
- 1900 – At the Polo Grounds, Christy Mathewson makes his first start, pitching a complete game loss to the Orphans. Chicago wins, 6-5, scoring four runs in the 1st, thanks to an error by 1B Jack Doyle. (2)
- 1902 – Joe Tinker, Johnny Evers and Frank Chance play their first game as a SS-2B-1B combo for Chicago. Germany Schaefer is at 3B as Chicago clips St. Louis, 12-0. (2)
- 1906 – At St. Louis, Chicago tops the Cardinals, 6-2, as Mordecai “Three Finger” Brown wins his 11th straight. (2)
- 1925 – Brooklyn’s Dazzy Vance narrowly misses back-to-back no-hitters over Philadelphia, pitching a 10-1 no-hitter five days after a 1-0 one-hitter. The Phils’ lone run is scored by Chicken Hawks, who reaches second base on an error. Five days earlier it was Hawks’ 2nd-inning single that ruined Vance’s no-hitter. On June 17, 1923, Vance lost a no-hitter with two out in the ninth. In the second game, the Phils win, 7-3, behind Hawks’ grand slam. (1,2)
- 1931 – At Wrigley Field, the Cubs win 11-7 over the Braves when player-manager Rogers Hornsby cracks an 11th-inning pinch grand slam. This is the first extra-inning pinch grand slam in major league history. The Cubs take the second game, 8- , behind Guy Bush’s one-hitter, his second of the year. His first was against the Cards on August 9th. (2)
- 1934 – Judge Kenesaw Mountain Landis sells the World Series broadcast rights to the Ford Motor Company for $100,000. Previously no fee had been charged. (1,2)
- 1938 – A special committee names Alexander Cartwright to Baseball’s Hall of Fame for originating the sport’s basic concepts. Henry Chadwick, inventor of the box score and the first baseball writer, is also honored. (2)
- 1942 – Chicago Cub SS Lennie Merullo makes a major league record four errors in the 2nd inning of the nightcap against the Boston Braves. Merullo’s son is born today and is named Boots. The Cubs win, 12-8, after losing the first game, 10-6. (2)
- 1959 – Glen Hobbie of the Cubs stops Ken Boyer’s hitting streak at 29 games. He was 41 for 117 for a .350 mark over the course of his streak. Hobbie allows just four hits in shutting out the Cards, 8-0. (2)
- 1960 – Eighteen-year-old OF Danny Murphy becomes the youngest Cub to hit a home run when he clouts a three-run homer off Bob Purkey, but the Reds win, 8-6, in Cincinnati. Murphy will play just 49 games for the Cubs from 1960 to 1962. He will come back as a pitcher for the White Sox in 1969 and 1970. (2)
- 1964 – St. Louis becomes the first National League club to score in each inning since the Giants did it on June 1, 1923. They coast, 15-2, at Wrigley Field with Curt Simmons improving his record to 15-9. Dick Ellsworth goes to 14-15 for Chicago. Julian Javier, Lou Brock and Mike Shannon homer for the Birds. A dropped pop-up in the top of the ninth secures St. Louis’ place in history. (2)
- 1970 – At Wrigley Field, the Pirates lead the Cubs, 2-1, with two outs and no one on in the 9th when Willie Smith hits a routine fly to Matty Alou. Alou drops it and three singles later the Cubs have a 3-2 win. The victory puts the Cubs a game behind the Bucs and a half-game behind the Mets. (2)
- 1972 – Roberto Clemente’s final career regular-season home run – No. 240 – propels Pittsburgh to a 6-4 win over Chicago. It comes, appropriately enough, off Fergie Jenkins, Clemente’s old friend and frequent HR victim and within the “friendly confines” of Wrigley Field. Today’s blast is a two-run, tie-breaking bomb, “crashed deep into the center field seats,” as per Post-Gazette scribe Charley Feeney. “Clemente just hit everything I had,” admits Jenkins. “He hit a slider for a single, a fastball for a triple and another slider for the home run. He’s something.” (2)
- 1989 – Fay Vincent is elected baseball’s eighth commissioner, succeeding the late Bart Giamatti, whom he served as deputy commissioner. (2)
- 1991 – A 55-ton concrete beam crashes onto an empty public walkway at Olympic Stadium in Montreal. The Expos will reschedule, playing their final 13 home games on the road while the stadium is repaired and growing cracks in concrete ribs supporting the stadium are checked out. (1,2)
- 1998 – Sammy Sosa hits his 61st and 62nd home runs of the season against the Milwaukee Brewers to tie the National League record of ten multi-homer games in a single season set by Ralph Kiner in 1947. The two home runs pace the Cubs to an 11-10 win, and tie Sosa with Mark McGwire for the home run lead. (1,2)
- 2020 – Alec Mills* of the Cubs pitches a no-hitter, defeating the Brewers, 12-0, in only the 15th start of his career. (2)
Cubs Birthdays: John Kelleher, Dutch Ruether, Rabbit Warstler, Greg Hibbard, Wade Miller, Alfonso Rivas III.
Today in History:
- 122 – Building begins on Hadrian’s Wall, Northern England.
- 1501 – Michelangelo begins work on his statue of David, a masterpiece of Renaissance sculpture.
- 1845 – English chemist Michael Faraday discovers the ‘Faraday effect’, the influence of a magnetic field on polarized light.
- 1973 – US Congress passes & sends a bill to President Nixon to lift NFL football’s television blackout of sold out games.
Common sources:
- (1) — Today in Baseball History.
- (2) — Baseball Reference.
- (3) — Society for American Baseball Research.
- (4) — Baseball Hall of Fame.
- (5) — This Day in Chicago Cubs history.
- For world history.
*pictured.
Some of these items spread from site to site without being verified. That is exactly why we ask for reputable sources if you have differences with a posted factoid. We are trying to set the record as straight as possible. But it isn’t brain surgery.
Also, the ‘history’ segment is highly edited for space and interest. Of course a great many other things happened on those days. We try to follow up on the interesting or unfamiliar ones.
Thanks for reading.