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Baseball history unpacked, March 30

A thrice-weekly compendium of #Cubs, #MLB, and #MiLB historical factoids, just for you. This one now comes in purple.

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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. We also add a bit of world history, for perspective’s sake.

Today in baseball history:

Cubs birthdays: Tom Burns, George Van Haltren, Herman Bronkie, Ed Sicking, Ripper Collins, Jake Marisnick.

Today in world history:

  • 240 BC - First recorded perihelion passage of Halley’s Comet.
  • 988 - Boudouin IV with the Beard becomes earl of Flanders (some say ‘count of Flanders’).
  • 1282 - The people of Sicily rebel against the Angevin king Charles I, in what becomes known as the Sicilian Vespers.
  • 1778 - Playwright Voltaire crowned with laurel wreath.
  • 1858 - Pencil with attached eraser patented (Hyman L Lipman of Philadelphia).
  • 1867 - Alaska Purchase: US buys Alaska from Russia for $7,200,000 ($109 million in 2018), roughly 2 cents an acre.
  • 1870 - 15th Amendment to the US constitution is adopted, guarantees right to vote regardless of race.
  • 1950 - Bell Telephone Laboratories announces invention of the phototransistor in Murray Hill, New Jersey.
  • 1981 - US President Ronald Reagan is shot and wounded in an assassination attempt by John Hinckley, three others are also wounded.

Common sources:

... and always, thanks to JohnW53 for additional wisdom.

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. And thanks for reading!