A long time, the period of my Dodgers in Brooklyn was a time of yore. Black and white images of people I did not really know. This totally changed when I read Kahn’s The Boys of Summer and Kearn Goodwin’s Wait Till Next Year. Many biographies and moving images like in the Lords of Flatbush and the Hollywood movie 42 later, I can say I love the Brooklyn times as much as I do their years in Los Angeles.
Reese, Snider, Robinson, Campanella, Hodges all played at Ebbets Field and under the management of Walter O’Malley won their first world series.
In the 20’s and 30’s, though, the team was known as the daffiness boys and them bums. Things weren’t good in Brooklyn. After their World Series appearances in 1916 and 1920 it took the boys in blue eleven years to reach another one.
Then, in ‘43 a new guy arrived in Brooklyn and he had a plan. He had won four World Series with the Cardinals, and stood at the birth of the modern minor league farm system. He introduced the batting helmet and batting cages. But he wasn’t done. Branch Rickey was aware what a treasure trove of talent the negro leagues were. In 1947 he added Jackie Robinson to the roster and history was made. That same year the Dodgers reached the World Series losing to the mighty Yankees. Rickey was the founder of the Boys of Summer who would blossom in the 1950’s.
For some time now, I wanted to own something related to Rickey. Because of his mark on baseball history in general and the Dodgers organization in particular. Also, we share our birthday. 89 years apart, but hey... it’s something.
Earlier this year I came across an auction of a letter signed by Rickey. It’s short and to the point. One Leslie Stockton sent some snapshots to Rickey and a request for an autograph, which he sent her back. I fell in love with it because I wanted his autograph and this letter could just well have been sent my way. I bid again and again and it finally was mine. It's a fantastic piece of Dodgers history
Reese, Snider, Robinson, Campanella, Hodges all played at Ebbets Field and under the management of Walter O’Malley won their first world series.
In the 20’s and 30’s, though, the team was known as the daffiness boys and them bums. Things weren’t good in Brooklyn. After their World Series appearances in 1916 and 1920 it took the boys in blue eleven years to reach another one.
Then, in ‘43 a new guy arrived in Brooklyn and he had a plan. He had won four World Series with the Cardinals, and stood at the birth of the modern minor league farm system. He introduced the batting helmet and batting cages. But he wasn’t done. Branch Rickey was aware what a treasure trove of talent the negro leagues were. In 1947 he added Jackie Robinson to the roster and history was made. That same year the Dodgers reached the World Series losing to the mighty Yankees. Rickey was the founder of the Boys of Summer who would blossom in the 1950’s.
For some time now, I wanted to own something related to Rickey. Because of his mark on baseball history in general and the Dodgers organization in particular. Also, we share our birthday. 89 years apart, but hey... it’s something.
Earlier this year I came across an auction of a letter signed by Rickey. It’s short and to the point. One Leslie Stockton sent some snapshots to Rickey and a request for an autograph, which he sent her back. I fell in love with it because I wanted his autograph and this letter could just well have been sent my way. I bid again and again and it finally was mine. It's a fantastic piece of Dodgers history
The letter is dated September 12th 1949. A day after finishing a four game series against the Giants, winning 3, only five weeks after he was on the cover of Newsweek magazine, some weeks before and a year before Walter O’Malley bought him out for 1,05 million dollars.
I love to look at details and I wonder what the little scratch of ink is just below his signature. Was it placed there before Rickey signed it or after? It makes the letter a little more special in my opinion.
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