1.
Exposition Park (Pittsburgh)
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Exposition Park was the name given to three historic stadiums, located in what is today Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. The fields were used mainly for baseball and American football from c.1879 to c. The ballparks were located on the north side of the Allegheny River in Allegheny City. The city was annexed into Pittsburgh in 1907, which became the citys North Side, due to flooding from the nearby river, the three stadiums exact locations varied somewhat. The final version of the ballpark was between the sites of Three Rivers Stadium and PNC Park. In 1903, the incarnation of Exposition Park was the first National League ballpark to host a World Series game. Named for other expositions that would be there, including horse racing and circuses. Despite its reason for construction Exposition Park II was built closer to the River, the Alleghenys played at the second incarnation of the park until they moved to Recreation Park in 1884, which was several blocks north and out of the flood plain. While the Pittsburg Pirates were playing games at Recreation Park, owners John Beemer. Lennon of the Pittsburgh Burghers constructed a park near the former site of Exposition Park I and II. Exposition Park III included a wooden grandstand around the infield. Total capacity was about 10,000 spectators, the seats faced the Allegheny River and the Point. The Burghers played at the stadium during the 1890 Players League season— both the team and leagues only season in existence, on June 10,1890, Jocko Fields of the Pittsburgh Burghers hit the first home run at Exposition Park III. The Pittsburg Pirates moved to Exposition Park the following season, on April 24,1891, Fred Carroll hit the first home run by a Pirate in the stadium. Under the management of Fred Clarke the Pirates won the National League pennant in 1901,1902, after the 1903 season, Dreyfuss and Boston Americans owner Henry Killilea organized a best of nine game series to match the two pennant winners against each other. The first World Series held three games in Boston before moving to Exposition Park with the Pirates leading the series 2–1, on October 6,1903,7,600 people attended the first World Series game in a National League stadium—the Pirates won by one run. The following day 12,000 people attended the game, forcing spectators to stand behind a rope in the outfield. The Pirates lost three of four games at Exposition Park and eventually the Series, during a July 4,1902 doubleheader against the Brooklyn Superbas, an Allegheny flood caused water to rise to thigh level in center and right fields, and about head level in deep center
2.
George Gibson (baseball)
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Gibson, nicknamed Mooney, was a Canadian professional baseball player, coach, scout and manager. He played as a catcher in Major League Baseball from 1905 to 1918 during a period in history known as the Dead-ball era. Gibson spent the majority of his career with the Pittsburgh Pirates before serving as a player-coach for the New York Giants for his final two seasons. He later became a minor league manager for the Toronto Maple Leafs before returning to the leagues as a manager for the Pirates. Gibson was regarded as one of the National Leagues premier catchers because of his defensive skills and his strong. He was also known for his smart pitch-calling and his ability to hold runners on base and his reputation as a defensive stand out is enhanced because of the era in which he played. He had to every type of pitch imaginable, such as shine balls, spitballs, knuckleballs. Gibson was inducted into Canadas Sports Hall of Fame in 1958, born a stones throw away from Tecumseh Park in London, Ontario, Gibson gained the nickname Mooney as a youngster. Some sources suggest that the nickname was inspired by his round, moon-shaped face and he then spent two seasons playing for the Montreal Royals before his contract was purchased by the Pittsburgh Pirates in June 1905. Gibson made his league debut July 2,1905 at the age of 24. Gibson stood 511.5 and weighed 190 pounds, which was considered large for a player of his era. Although he did not provide prolific offensive statistics, he did provide excellent defensive abilities and was a student of baseball strategy under the tutelage of Pirates manager Fred Clarke. The Pirates finished in place three times in four seasons between 1905 and 1908. During the 1908 season, they were involved in a pennant race with the Chicago Cubs. The Pirates were in first place going into the day of the season. Gibson was in his prime during the 1909 season when he caught in 134 consecutive games and he set another major league record for games played in a season by a catcher with 150, which was also previously held by McGuire since 1895. His games caught in a season record stood until 1920 when Ray Schalk caught 151 games and his record of 134 consecutive games caught would stand until 1940 when it was broken by Ray Mueller. Gibson hit a double for the hit in the last game played at Pittsburghs Exposition Park on June 29,1909
3.
Honus Wagner
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Johannes Peter Honus Wagner was an American baseball shortstop who played 21 seasons in Major League Baseball from 1897 to 1917, almost entirely for the Pittsburgh Pirates. Wagner won eight batting titles, tied for the most in National League history with Tony Gwynn and he also led the league in slugging six times, and in stolen bases five times. Wagner was nicknamed The Flying Dutchman due to his superb speed and this name was a nod to the popular folk-tale made into a famous opera by another Wagner. In 1936, the Baseball Hall of Fame inducted Wagner as one of the first five members and he received the second-highest vote total, behind Ty Cobb and tied with Babe Ruth. Cobb himself called Wagner maybe the greatest star ever to take the diamond, in addition, Wagner is the featured player of one of the rarest and most valuable baseball cards in the world. Wagner was born to German immigrants Peter and Katheryn Wagner in the borough of Chartiers, in what is now Carnegie, Wagner was one of nine children. As a child, he was called Hans by his mother, Hans was also an alternate nickname during his major league career. Wagner dropped out of school at age 12 to help his father, in their free time, he and his brothers played sandlot baseball and developed their skills to such an extent that three of his brothers went on to become professionals as well. Wagners older brother, Albert Butts Wagner, who had a major league career himself, is often credited with getting Honus his first tryout. Butts persuaded his manager to take a look at his younger brother, following his brother, Wagner trained to be a barber before becoming successful in baseball. In 1916, Wagner married Bessie Baine Smith, and the couple would have three daughters, Elva Katrina, Betty Baine, and Virginia Mae, Honus brother Albert Butts Wagner was considered the ballplayer of the family. Albert suggested Honus in 1895 when his Inter-State League team was in need of help, Wagner would play for five teams in that first year, in three different leagues over the course of 80 games. In 1896 Edward Barrow, from the Wheeling, West Virginia, team that Wagner was playing on, decided to take Honus with him to his next team, the Paterson Silk Sox. Barrow proved to be a talent scout, as Wagner could play wherever he was needed. Wagner would hit.313 for Paterson in 1896 and.375 in 74 games in 1897, recognizing that Wagner should be playing at the highest level, Barrow contacted the Louisville Colonels, who had finished last in the National League in 1896 with a record of 38-93. They were doing better in 1897 when Barrow persuaded club president Barney Dreyfuss, club secretary Harry Pulliam, Pulliam, though, persuaded Dreyfuss and Clarke to take a chance on him. Wagner debuted with Louisville on July 19, and hit.338 in 61 games, by his second season, Wagner was already one of the best hitters in the National League although he came up short a percentage point from finishing the season at.300. Following the 1899 season, the NL contracted from twelve to eight teams, along with Wagner, owner Barney Dreyfuss, who had purchased half ownership in the Pirates, took many of his other top players with him to Pittsburgh
4.
Allegheny, Pennsylvania
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Allegheny City is the name of a former Pennsylvania municipality now reorganized and merged into the larger community, the modern City of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania. It was annexed by Pittsburgh in 1907, the City of Allegheny was laid out in 1788 according to a plan by John Redick. The lots were sold in Philadelphia by the State government or given as payment to Revolutionary War veterans and it was incorporated as a borough in 1828 and as a city in 1840. Prior to the 1850s, most of the area was largely farmland. It was commonly referred to as Deutschtown, derived from the German word Deutsch, referring to the language and ethnicity. The annexation of Allegheny City by Pittsburgh began in 1906 and was effected in 1907 and it was approved by the United States Government in 1911. The annexation was controversial at the time, as a majority of Allegheny City residents were opposed to the merger. Previous Pennsylvania law had directed that a majority of the voters in each merging municipality had to approve an annexation agreement, in 1906, the State Assembly passed a new law that authorized annexations if a majority of the total voters in both combined municipalities approved the merger. The annexation was rejected by the residents of Allegheny City by a 2,1 margin, but was approved by more populous Pittsburgh residents. Allegheny City residents tried unsuccessfully for years to have the annexation overturned in court. The population of Pittsburgh rose from 321,616 in 1900 to 533,905 in 1910, which included the 132,283 who lived in Allegheny in 1910, when the two cities were joined, both of the old ward systems were discarded. A new ward system was established made up of 27 wards, in the new ward system, Allegheny was divided into wards 21 to 27. Its past territory is seen by viewing a map of the city wards. The Carnegie Library, the Old Post Office Building, and the Buhl Planetarium buildings were not demolished, the H. J. Heinz Company built its factory in Allegheny City, close to the Chestnut Street bridge. Heyl & Patterson Inc. a manufacturer of railcar dumpers and ship unloaders, the surviving structures are now occupied by a furniture warehouse and a bus garage. Railroad lines were built along the side of the Allegheny for the Pittsburgh, Fort Wayne and Chicago. When workers in Pittsburgh struck against the Pennsylvania Railroad after wage cuts in July 1877, the Teutonia Männerchor Hall in the East Allegheny neighborhood of Pittsburgh, Pennsylvania, is a building constructed in 1888. It was listed on the National Register of Historic Places in 2004, the Teutonia Männerchor is a private membership club with the purpose of furthering choral singing, German cultural traditions and good fellowship
5.
Road (sports)
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A road game or away game is a sports game where the specified team is not the host and must travel to another venue. Most professional teams represent cities or towns and amateur sports teams often represent academic institutions, each team has a location where it practices during the season and where it hosts games. When a team is not the host, it must travel to games. Thus, when a team is not hosting a game, the team is described as the team, the visiting team, or the away team. The venue in which the game is played is described as the stadium or the road. The host team is said to be the home team, major sporting events, if not held at a neutral venue, are often over several legs at each teams home ground, so that neither team has an advantage over the other. Occasionally, the team may not have to travel very far at all to a road game. These matches often become local derbies, a few times a year, a road team may even be lucky enough to have the road game played at their own home stadium or arena. This is prevalent in college athletics where many schools will play in regional leagues or groundshare. The related term true road game has seen increasing use in U. S. college sports in the 21st century, while regular-season tournaments and other special events have been part of college sports from their creation, the 21st century has seen a proliferation of such events. These are typically held at sites, with some of them taking place outside the contiguous U. S. or even outside the country entirely. In turn, this has led to the use of true road game to refer to contests played at one home venue. In some association football leagues, particularly in Europe, the teams fans sit in their own section. Depending on the stadium, they will either sit in a designated section or be separated from the home fans by a cordon of police officers. However, in the leagues in England, supporters may be free to mix. When games are played at a site, for instance the FA Cup final in England which is always played at Wembley Stadium. This results in each team occupying one half of the stadium and this is different from other sports, particularly in North America, where very few fans travel to games played away from their home stadium. Home and away fans are not separated at these games
6.
National League
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Both leagues currently have 15 teams. The two league champions of 1903 arranged to compete against each other in the inaugural World Series, after the 1904 champions failed to reach a similar agreement, the two leagues formalized the World Series as an arrangement between the leagues. National League teams have won 48 of the 112 World Series contested from 1903 to 2016, the 2016 National League champions are the Chicago Cubs. By 1875, the National Association of Professional Base Ball Players was dangerously weak, additionally, Hulbert had a problem—five of his star players were threatened with expulsion from the NAPBBP because Hulbert had signed them to his club using what were considered questionable means. Hulbert had a vested interest in creating his own league. After recruiting St. Louis privately, four western clubs met in Louisville, Kentucky, Boston Red Stockings, the dominant team in the N. A. Hartford Dark Blues from the N. A. Mutual of New York from the N. A. St. Louis Brown Stockings from the N. A, the only strong club from 1875 excluded in 1876 was a second one in Philadelphia, often called the White Stockings or Phillies. The first game in National League history was played on April 22,1876, at Philadelphias Jefferson Street Grounds, 25th & Jefferson, the new leagues authority was tested after the first season. The National League operated with six clubs during 1877 and 1878, over the next several years, various teams joined and left the struggling league. By 1880, six of the eight members had folded. The two remaining original NL franchises, Boston and Chicago, remain in operation today as the Atlanta Braves, in 1883 the New York Gothams and Philadelphia Phillies began National League play. Both teams remain in the NL today, the Phillies in their original city, the NL encountered its first strong rival organization when the American Association began play in 1882. The A. A. played in cities where the NL did not have teams, offered Sunday games and alcoholic beverages in locales where permitted, the National League and the American Association participated in a version of the World Series seven times during their ten-year coexistence. These contests were less organized than the modern Series, lasting as few as three games and as many as fifteen, with two Series ending in disputed ties, the NL won four times and the A. A. only once, in 1886. Starting with the Pittsburgh Pirates in 1887, the National League began to raid the American Association for franchises to replace NL teams that folded and this undercut the stability of the A. A. Other new leagues that rose to compete with the National League were the Union Association, the Union Association was established in 1884 and folded after playing only one season, its league champion St. Louis Maroons joining the NL. The NL suffered many defections of star players to the Players League, the Brooklyn, Chicago, Pittsburgh, and New York franchises of the NL absorbed their Players League counterparts. The labor strife of 1890 hastened the downfall of the American Association, after the 1891 season, the A. A. disbanded and merged with the NL, which became known legally for the next decade as the National League and American Association
7.
Barney Dreyfuss
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Bernhard Barney Dreyfuss was an executive in Major League Baseball who owned the Pittsburgh Pirates franchise from 1900 to his death. He is often credited with the creation of the modern baseball World Series and he also built one of baseballs first modern steel and concrete baseball parks, Forbes Field, in 1909. During his period of ownership, the Pirates won six National League pennants and World Series titles in 1909 and 1925, Dreyfuss was born in Freiburg, Grand Duchy of Baden in 1865. He attended school in Freiburg and later worked in a bank in nearby Karlsruhe, at the age of 16, he emigrated in 1881 to the US to escape conscription into the German Army. At the time, his prospects of being drafted into the military was high, Dreyfusss father, Samuel Dreyfuss, was actually an American citizen since 1861, who had returned to Germany at the outbreak of the Civil War. Samuel Dreyfuss had made a fortune selling spirits to the Native Americans, once in America, Barney Dreyfuss lived and worked with the Bernheim family in Paducah, Kentucky. The Bernheims were relatives of his grandfather, Leon Bernheim, in 1888, he moved with the Bernheim family to Louisville, Kentucky. Dreyfuss arrived knowing little English, but he became a quick learner, in just a few years, he rose from being a clerk to an officer of Bernheim Brothers, the creator of I. W. Harper bourbon. Dreyfuss enjoyed the game of baseball and he fueled his interest by organizing amateur baseball teams first for the distillery workers, then semi-pro clubs around Louisville. In 1889 the distillery expanded into larger quarters of Louisville, Dreyfuss quickly used the increased profits to buy a piece of the Louisville Colonels of the American Association. The team won the pennant in 1890 against the Brooklyn Bridegrooms. However, the American Association fell apart in 1891, as a result, Dreyfuss moved the Colonels into the National League. One of his best decisions was hiring a local city editor and educated lawyer, Harry Clay Pulliam, to serve as his club secretary, when Dreyfuss immigrated to America, it was Pulliam who taught him how to speak English. However Pulliams greatest contribution to Colonels occurred when he convinced Dreyfuss to sign future Hall of Famer Honus Wagner to the team, for much of the 1890s, the Colonels were in last place in the National League. In 1899, Dreyfuss paid $50,000 to acquire ownership of the Colonels. By this time, however, the National League contracted several teams after the 1899 season, as part of the deal, he negotiated the transfer of the best Louisville players, namely Wagner, Fred Clarke, Tommy Leach, Deacon Phillippe, and Rube Waddell to Pittsburgh. The Colonels president, Harry Pulliam, also left for the Pirates with Dreyfuss, in Pittsburgh, Honus Wagner soon emerged as the National Leagues biggest star. The Pirates then won NL pennants in 1901,1902, and 1903, however a bidding war was taking place between the National League and the upstart American League
8.
Fred Clarke
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Fred Clifford Clarke was a Major League Baseball player from 1894 to 1915 and manager from 1897 to 1915. A Hall of Famer, Clarke played for and managed both the Louisville Colonels and Pittsburgh Pirates and he was a left fielder and left-handed batter. Of the nine pennants in Pittsburgh franchise history, Clarke was the player-manager for four of them and he and fellow Hall of Famers Honus Wagner and Vic Willis led Pittsburgh to a victory over Ty Cobb and the Detroit Tigers in the 1909 World Series. Clarke batted over.300 in 11 different seasons and his 35-game hitting streak in 1895 was the second-longest in Major League history at the time and is still tied for 11th-longest. For six years, Clarke held the Major League record for wins by a manager, Fred Clarke was born on a farm near Winterset, Iowa. At age two, his family moved as part of a covered wagon caravan from Iowa to Kansas before relocating to Des Moines, Iowa, five years later. As a child in Des Moines, Clarke sold newspapers for the Iowa State Register where his boss was future Baseball Hall of Fame member, Ed Barrow. In 1892, a team in Hastings, Nebraska sent a railroad ticket to Des Moines semiprofessional player, Byron McKibbon. Clarke impressed the Hastings team and he signed his first professional contract and he was in the Southern League at age 21 and played for teams in Montgomery, Alabama, and Savannah, Georgia. Clarke was discovered in the leagues by Louisville part-owner, Barney Dreyfuss. In his first game, he collected five hits in five at bats which is still a Major League record, in his second season, he asserted himself with a batting average of.347,191 hits and 96 runs which were all best on the team by far. In 1897, Clarke took over managerial duties while only 24 years old, as a player, he hit a career high.390. Only the best average of Willie Keelers career stopped Clarke from winning his only batting title, despite Clarkes excellent hitting and the presence of fellow Hall of Famers Honus Wagner and Rube Waddell, the team struggled for several years. While in Louisville, Clarke was teamed up with pitcher Chick Fraser, Clarke and Fraser became brothers-in-law when they married sisters. When the Colonels folded, Barney Dreyfuss became the owner of the Pittsburgh franchise and tapped Clarke, Wagner, Waddell, Deacon Phillippe, in 1900, Clarke joined the Pittsburgh Pirates as a player and manager, roles he would embrace until his retirement in 1915. 1903 was arguably the best hitting season of Clarkes career as he led the Major Leagues in slugging average and OPS and he finished second only to his teammate, Honus Wagner, for the National League batting title. In the first World Series, Clarke hit.265 but Bostons Cy Young and Bill Dinneen outpitched Pittsburgh overall and won the series in eight games. In the 1909 World Series, Clarke batted only.211, Clarke also set a record for most walks for one player in a World Series game with four in Game 7
9.
1905 Philadelphia Phillies season
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The 1905 Philadelphia Phillies season was a season in Major League Baseball. The Phillies finished fourth in the National League with a record of 83 wins and 69 losses, the Phillies won the third, fifth, seventh, and eighth games as the teams split the 1905 series four games to four. Note, Pos = Position, G = Games played, AB = At bats, H = Hits, = Batting average, HR = Home runs, RBI = Runs batted in Note, G = Games played, AB = At bats, H = Hits, Avg
