Glory Days F or more than half of their history the Dodgers were based in Brooklyn New York People were accustomed to watching good baseball there long before the team played its first game In fact the best clubs and players had been meeting in Brooklyn starting in the 1850s When the Dodgers first took the field in 1884 fans expected this tradition to continue The team went through several names in its first few seasons including the Atlantics and Grays They eventually were nicknamed the Dodgers in honor of Brooklyn’s pedestrians who had to dodge the trolleys that crisscrossed the city’s avenues and streets In 1888 the team was renamed the Bridegrooms after several of its players had weddings The Bridegrooms were members 6
of the American Association AA In 1890 they decided to join the rival National League NL They won the pennant in their first year in the league Brooklyn’s stars included Willie Keeler Joe Kelley Hughie Jennings Bill Dahlen Fielder Jones Brickyard Kennedy and Joe McGinnity The team’s owner was Charles Ebbets who started his career as a peanut vendor and ticket-taker In 1913 Ebbets built a baseball palace for the Dodgers and named it Ebbets Field By this time fans were calling the team the Robins in honor of Wilbert Robinson Brooklyn’s popular manager Uncle Robbie led the club to the pennant in 1916 and 1920 Brooklyn struggled during the 1920s and 1930s before rising to the top of the NL in 1941 Known as the Dodgers once again the team starred Pete Reiser Dolph Camilli Kirby Higbe and Whit Wyatt From 1947 to 1956 the Dodgers were the best team LEFT Wilbert Robinson managed the Dodgers to two pennants ABOVE Dolph Camilli led the NL in home runs in 1941 7
in the NL They won six pennants during that time Something more important set the Dodgers apart however In the 1940s they changed the face of baseball by signing the first African-American stars The man who broke baseball’s color barrier was Jackie Robinson He would eventually be elected to the Hall of Fame In addition to Robinson the Dodgers were led by Duke Snider Roy Campanella Pee Wee Reese Gil Hodges Don Newcombe and Carl Erskine Campanella and Newcombe were African-Americans Brooklyn won its only World Series in 1955 against the New York Yankees In 1958 the people of Brooklyn were shocked when team owner Walter O’Malley announced that the Dodgers were moving to Los Angeles California Baseball fans on the West Coast were ecstatic They had wanted their own big-league club for 20 years With pitchers Don Drysdale and Sandy Koufax leading the way the Dodgers won the World Series in 1959 1963 and 1965 LEFT Jackie Robinson broke baseball’s color barrier in 1947 and then made the Dodgers the top team in the league ABOVE Sandy Koufax pitched the Dodgers to three championships 9
