Baseball history unpacked, November 29

On Mondays, Wednesdays, and Fridays, Bleed Cubbie Blue brings a you a light-hearted, Cubs-centric look at baseball’s colorful past, with plenty of the lore and deep dives into various narratives that expand over the course of time. Here’s a handy Cubs timeline, to help you follow along. Don’t be afraid to click the links for ‘inside baseball’ on the entries, which change from year to year as we re-examine the subjects.

Today in baseball history:

• 1926 - Tris Speaker resigns as Indians manager. Stories of a thrown game and betting on games by Ty Cobb and Speaker gain momentum when Judge Landis holds a secret hearing with the two stars and former P-OF Joe Wood. The story and testimony will not be released until December 21st. Former Tiger P Dutch Leonard wrote to Harry Heilmann that he had turned over letters written to him by Wood and Cobb to American League president Ban Johnson, implicating the two in betting on a Tiger-Cleveland game played in Detroit, MI, on September 25, 1919. He charged that Cobb and Speaker conspired to let Detroit win to help them gain third-place money. At a secret meeting of AL directors, it was decided to let Cobb and Speaker resign with no publicity. But, as rumors spread, Judge Landis takes charge of the matter and holds the hearings, at which Leonard refuses to appear. Cobb and Wood admit to the letters, but say it was a horse racing bet, and contend Leonard is angry for having been released to the Pacific Coast League by Cobb. Speaker, not named in the letters, denies everything. Public sympathy is with the stars, but the matter will remain unresolved until January of next year. (1,2)
• 1962 - Major league officials and player representatives agree to return to a single All-Star Game in 1963. The players’ pension fund will receive 95 percent of the one game’s proceeds (rather than 60 percent of two games). (1,2)
• 1971 - The Cubs trade P Ken Holtzman to the A’s for OF Rick Monday, (2)
• 1990 - A consortium of Canadian investors led by Montreal Expos president Claude Brochu agrees to buy the club from Charles Bronfman for a reported $85 million, assuring that the team will remain in Montréal, QC. (2)

Cubs birthdays: Shadow Pyle, Jake Weimer, Tom Hughes, Carter Elliott, Irv Noren, Dan McGinn, Howard Johnson, Francis Beltran. Also notable: Pedro Martinez, Mariano Rivera HOF.

Today in world history:

• 526 - A possible date for the Antioch earthquake in present-day Syria (then the Byzantine Empire) which killed 200,000 people.
• 1775 - Sir James Jay invents invisible ink.
• 1877 - US inventor Thomas Edison demonstrates his hand-cranked phonograph for the first time.
• 1910 - The first US patent for inventing the traffic lights system is issued to Ernest Sirrine
• 1934 - Chicago Bears beat Detroit (19-16) in 1st NFL game broadcast nationally
• 1935 - Physicist Erwin Schrödinger publishes his famous thought experiment “Schrödinger’s cat”, a paradox that illustrates the problem of the Copenhagen interpretation of quantum mechanics.

Common sources:

• (1) — Today in Baseball History.
• (2) — Baseball Reference.
• (3) — Society for American Baseball Research.
• (4) — Baseball Hall of Fame.
• (5) — This Day in Chicago Cubs history.
• For world history.

There is a very active baseball history community and there are many facets to their views. We strive for clarity. Please be aware that we are trying to make the historical record as represented by our main sources coherent and as accurate as is possible. No item is posted here without corroboration. Some of these items spread from site to site without being verified. That is exactly why we ask for reputable sources, so that we can address them to the originators. BBRef is very cooperative in this regard, as are SABR and the Baseball Almanac. We have removed thenationalpastime from our sourcing list, as there have been multiple complaints about their content and they do not respond to attempts to communicate.

Also please remember that this is supposed to be fun.

Thank you for your cooperation.