All-Star Game beginnings

Most of the time I have been using this forum to make light of interesting yet lesser known events in the history of sports. Today I am taking the easy way out. Next week many fans will be watching Baseball All-Star game from Angels Stadium in Anaheim, California, a stadium built less then a mile north of where I was born. How many of todays baseball fans know and understand the history of the All-Star Game.

Being that today is July 6, many of you must be guessing that the first game was played on July 6. You are correct, July 6, 1933 at Comiskey Park in Chicago, Illinois. The game was orginally set up as a one time event by Arch Ward, the Sports editor of the Chicago Tribune. The American League won the game by a score of 4-2. The game was played as a part of the 1933 Worlds Fair. The managers were the recently retired John McGraw formerly of the New York Giants and Connie Mack long time manager of the Philadlephia A's. Mack would go on to manage for 17 more years.

One of the lesser know facts here was that just 2 months later on September 10, Comiskey Park hosted the first ever East-West Game, the All-Star game for the Negro Leagues.

Comiskey Park would host the MLB All-Star game three times, the last was the 50th anniversary game played on, of course, July 6, 1983. When Fred Lynn of the American League came up in the third inning with the bases loaded, he became the first and so far, only player to hit a grand slam in all-star play.

Tomorrow we will talk about a rare event in the Pacific Coast League.