Covering the World Series Nearly a Century Ago

On October 19, 1911, in the midst of a six-day rain delay between games 3 and 4 of the 1911 World Series between the Philadelphia A's and the New York Giants, reporters at Shibe Park in Philadelphia had plenty of time on their hands. Figure 1 has former ballplayer–turned-reporter Sam Crane (far left) of the New York Evening Journal sitting next to a sleeping companion, while the official scorer and publisher of Reach's Baseball Guide and Sporting Life, Francis Richter (black mustache and Derby Hat), strikes a stoic poise.

Philadelphia won the series 4 games to 2. The series is best remembered for the 2 home runs hit by Frank "Home Run" Baker. The first home run (with one on) was off of Rube Marquard in the sixth inning of the second game. That play broke a 1–1 draw and allowed the A's to tie the series. The second home run, a solo shot in the succeeding game at the top of the ninth, was off Christy Mathewson and enabled Philadelphia to tie the game and to eventually win it in the eleventh inning.

All was not easy sailing for Baker during the 1911 series. In figure 2, Baker is spiked by Fred Snodgrass of the Giants as Snodgrass successfully stole third base in the sixth inning of the first game. In figure 3, players from both teams gather around Baker as the A's' trainer attends to him. The Giants won the first game, 2–1, as Mathewson out-dueled Charles "Chief" Bender.

Baker had a marvelous career, collecting 1,838 hits and a lifetime batting average of .307. However, only 96 of his hits were home runs. He played in the Dead Ball Era, when weekly statistics such as stolen bases and batting averages were regularly reported in newspapers but home runs were not because they were considered anomalies. Although Baker's 11 home runs in 1911 led the American League, he did not pick up his nickname "Home Run" until the World Series. Even then, his nickname had more to do with the circumstances of hitting the home runs off of elite pitchers Mathewson and Marquard on consecutive days than it did with his power hitting prowess. Baker led all players in the 1911 series with a .375 average. One might speculate with the six-day rain delay (the 6 game series started October 14 and ended on October 24) that sportswriters may have come up with the nickname, "Home Run," to fulfill their daily column requirements.

A year later in October, Edward Nichols of the New York Tribune coined the phrase "Baker" to mean a home run, a term used until Babe Ruth arrived on the home run scene. In 1919 when Ruth hit an unbelievable 29 home runs, Baker was tied for second place with 10.

In 1913 the A's and the Giants met again in the World Series. The reporters shown in figure 4 ("Knights of the Telegraph Keys") had a much briefer assignment than in 1911. Note how closer the press sat next to the action, slightly to the right of the home plate screen. However, in figure 5 we see that some of the best seats in Philadelphia's Shibe Park for the 1913 series were occupied by the police, thanks to the Hires Root Beer Company.