7. The 1920s brought in the first Golden Age of Major League Baseball
Baseball considers its modern era to have begun at the turn of the 20th century. But it really began in the 1920s. Prior to that decade, home runs were a rarity. In 1918, Boston’s Babe Ruth and Philadelphia’s Tilly Walker led the American League in home runs with 11. For the National League that year, 8 home runs sufficed to lead the league. In 1919 Ruth, still with Boston led all of baseball with a record-setting 29 homers. The following year, then with the New York Yankees, he hit 54. The National League leader for 1920, Cy Williams of the Philadelphia Phillies, hit a meager 15. The rest of baseball took some time to catch up with Ruth and the Yankees, but the age of the long ball had arrived. So had the age of the New York Yankees, who came to dominate the World Series.
Through the medium of the World Series, the Yankees became America’s team to either love or hate. Ruth’s exploits were followed in newspapers, on radio broadcasts, and in newsreels of the day. The Yankees’ first World Series appearance took place in 1921. It was the first World Series to be broadcast over radio, with sportswriter Grantland Rice covering the game for listeners on Pittsburgh’s KDKA. Rice was not at the ballpark, he read his broadcast off ticker-tape provided by Western Union. That practice continued for decades. Among its later practitioners was a future American president, Ronald Reagan, who broadcast Chicago Cubs games in Des Moines, Iowa on WHO radio. Others included Ernie Harwell, Mel Allen, and Red Barber. They received a cryptic message such as GB 5. From that, they described a ground ball to shortstop, and a hard throw to first for the out.