On Sept. 24, 1957, the Brooklyn Dodgers played their last game at historic Ebbets Field. When I say historic, that is not hyperbole. Many memorable events in the evolution of the national pastime took place there, none so momentous as the day 10 years earlier when Jackie Robinson broke the color barrier in organized baseball.
By 1957, Robinson had retired, however, and Dodgers' owner Walter O'Malley – along with his New York Giants counterpart Horace Stoneham – were less interested in social progress or nostalgia than the bottom line, as I'll explain further below. I've written about this exodus before, but with Major League Baseball on the verge of its post-season play, I thought I'd reprise it this morning.
It's hard to imagine in the era of ESPN's "Sports Center," with its nightly highlights, team-owned broadcast networks that televised every baseball team's games, interleague play, and nearly unfettered free agency, what it meant when a baseball franchise uprooted for greener pastures. It was as if your heroes left for another world, rarely to be glimpsed again. It also felt as though a core component of your city's identity was being ripped away.
"We're sorry to disappoint the kids of New York," Giants' owner Horace Stoneham had said on Aug. 19, 1957, while confirming the worst fears of National League fans in the five boroughs. "But we didn't see many of their parents out there at the Polo Grounds in recent years."
Stoneham had a valid point. Even with the great Willie Mays patrolling centerfield, the Giants were last in the league in attendance in 1956 and 1957. Even in 1954, the year they were the best team in baseball, the Giants averaged only 15,000 fans per game. The Dodgers' situation wasn't much different. Despite winning the pennant in 1955 and 1956, Brooklyn averaged only about 14,000 fans a game, and the team couldn't always sell out Ebbets Field even when they played the Giants, their natural rivals.
Dodger fans, who affectionately called their team the Brooklyn "Bums," knew in their hearts what the Giants' desertion meant: Their team was heading west, too. At least the Giants did their leave-taking right: They had a graceful goodbye ceremony at the Polo Grounds with some of the team's former stars in attendance.
Walter O'Malley forbade any such ceremony, and so, on Sept. 24, 1957, only 6,700 fans trudged to Ebbets Field for the last time. The Dodgers won, 2-0, in a game that seemed to centerfielder Duke Snider as if it were being played in twilight.
In the ensuing years, California would eclipse New York in many ways having nothing to do with baseball, and Stoneham and O'Malley would be credited for their foresight, and for starting a broader trend of West Coast expansion in other fields, too. It certainly paid off financially. The Los Angeles Dodgers are annual contenders and draw 3 million fans to Chavez Ravine annually.
On this date in 1957, however, there were sad little boys all over New York City and its environs. Sad girls, too, as Doris Kearns Goodwin described in her poignant memoir, "Wait Til Next Year."
Five months after the Bums left Brooklyn, as the Dodgers gathered in Vero Beach, Fla., for spring training, Doris Kearns' mother died. All her bereaved father could say at that moment was, "My pal is gone. My pal is gone." Many New Yorkers felt the same way. Their pals – their ballplayers – were gone.
Carl M. Cannon is the Washington bureau chief for RealClearPolitics. Reach him on X @CarlCannon.
