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A century ago, the World Series was born

"The Panama Canal, the Alaska boundary question, the troubles in the East have been sidetracked, and sleep has not been thought of until an answer was obtained to this momentous daily question: `What's the score?'"

A writer commenting on America's first World Series

On Oct. 1, 1903, just after 3pm, Boston's Cy Young delivered the first pitch of the first modern World Series. That season, the 36-year-old Young had won 28 games and had become the pitcher with the most career victories. Yet for all the drama of a professional career that began in 1890, Young had never experienced such a scene.

More than 16,000 fans crammed into the Huntington Avenue Base Ball Grounds to witness the opening game of the World's Championship Series against the formidable Pittsburgh Pirates. So many purchased tickets, which sold for US$0.50 and US$1, that management placed the overflow crowd behind makeshift ropes in the outfield. Thousands more followed the updates provided by telegraph operators and read about the games in special evening editions.

"The whole country," The Sporting News proclaimed, "is watching with great interest the world's championship contest."

Even casual observers wondered what would happen when the upstart American League and long-established National League faced off. The American League had been founded in 1901, and for two years the leagues had waged war by raiding each other for players and competing for fans. Some of the legends of the day had jumped to the new circuit: Nap Lajoie, Ed Delahanty and most of the pennant-winning Boston Americans (they would not become the Red Sox until 1908), including Cy Young and the player-manager, Jimmy Collins. One player who remained loyal to the National League was the Pirates' star shortstop, Honus Wagner, who earned US$5,000 that year but could have made US$20,000 if he had been willing to leave Pittsburgh.

Peace between the leagues resulted from a conference held in Cincinnati in January 1903. With the agreement, the leagues settled contracts, adopted common rules and established two eight-team circuits. The American League was permitted to start a franchise in New York: the Highlanders, who would later become the Yankees, finished fourth in their first season.

As the season progressed, fans buzzed about a possible postseason series between pennant winners. The Pirates' owner, Barney Dreyfuss, made a proposal to the Boston owner, Henry Killilea. On Sept. 16, they signed an agreement that provided for a five-of-nine-game series, two umpires for every game and rosters that could include only players who were on the team on Sept. 1.

Suspicions

The Pirates had won three consecutive pennants, but their pitching staff was suffering from injury and illness. And the Americans had Bill Dinneen, a 21-game winner, to complement Cy Young.

Boston was favored to win at home, yet promptly lost two of three games.

After the Boston defense, with two errors by catcher Lou Criger, yielded four runs in the first inning of the first game, some writers suspected that the Americans had thrown the game to collect on the favorable odds and increase their earnings by extending the series. Contracts had ended on Sept. 30, and players on both sides were competing for a percentage of the gate.

Gambling was rampant. Fans wagered openly, as did journalists and some players. Boston's loss in the first game, however, in all likelihood resulted from nervousness rather than malfeasance, and it rebounded to win the second game. In the third game, played on a Saturday, nearly 25,000 fans swarmed the park. Before the game, they burst through the outfield ropes and spread across the infield. It took police officers using hoses and players wielding bats to push the crowd back.

Boston lost, and the fans had themselves to blame as four routine balls, hit by the Pirates into the throng that stood only a couple of hundred feet from home plate, went as ground-rule doubles and accounted for three runs.

The overnight train to Pittsburgh carried not only the teams but also a group of Boston fans known as the Royal Rooters. Nothing kept the Rooters from Pittsburgh's Exposition Park, not even a lawsuit brought by a bandleader whom they had hired and then dismissed. They marched to the field and crooned songs and rooted tirelessly. But Boston lost Game 4 to fall behind, 3-1, in the series.

Changing fortunes

Then fortunes changed. Deacon Phillippe, the winning pitcher in all three Pittsburgh victories, was tiring and the Pirates' bats went silent. The player-manager, Fred Clarke, even postponed a game to give Phillippe an extra day's rest. Collins ranted over the tactic, but his club rallied to tie the series, then won again to go ahead, four games to three.

The teams returned to Boston to decide the series. Bill Dinneen, winner of Games 2 and 6, faced off against the exhausted Phillippe, who somehow yielded only three runs. In the top of the ninth, Dinneen had a shutout going. With two out, Honus Wagner came to bat. Wagner, who had hit .355 during the season, had no hits in the previous three games.

Wagner worked the count full. Dinneen delivered the next pitch. A reporter described the moment this way: "The big batsman's mighty shoulders heaved, the stands will swear that his very frame creaked, as he swung his bat with every ounce of power in his body, but the dull thud of the ball, as it nestled in Criger's waiting mitt, told the story."

National pastime

The first World Series also served to ratify the place of baseball as America's national pastime. The sport had been in a down cycle through the 1890s, but now commentators again saw in baseball those qualities that constituted the American character. From the beginning, the World Series served as an autumn rite in which the fans were entertained, enthralled and, if they were lucky, renewed.

Reflecting on the series, one writer observed, "The Panama Canal, the Alaska boundary question, the troubles in the East have been sidetracked, and sleep has not been thought of until an answer was obtained to this momentous daily question: `What's the score?'"

One hundred years later, the question remains as salient as ever.

Louis P. Masur is professor of history at City College of New York and author of Autumn Glory: Baseball's First World Series (Hill & Wang, 2003).
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