ray chapman dies after getting hit by pitch
One hundred years ago today … baseball player Ray Chapman died, having been hit on the head by a pitch the previous day. The incident is widely credited as the reason professional baseball adopted the batting helmet, and eventually outlawed spitballs and other ways of doctoring pitches.
The Evening World, 17 August 1920, p. 2. Chronicling America.
Yankees pitcher Carl Mays threw the fatal pitch in the fifth inning of a game against the Cleveland Indians. According to Don Jensen, “Many of the players and 20,000 fans heard an ‘explosive sound’”; sportswriter Fred Lieb would report that the impact made a “sickening thud” that could be heard by everyone in attendance.
There were immediate calls for Mays’s suspension or ejection from the sport, but no action was taken.
New York Times, 18 August 1920, p. 12.
Chapman was pronounced dead of multiple skull fractures in the early morning of August 17. That day, his casket was ceremoniously marched through Grand Central Terminal before being loaded on a train to Cleveland.
Daily News, 18 August 1920, p. 1. Newspapers.com.
The game had taken place at the Polo Grounds, West 155th Street in Manhattan. Chapman was taken to St. Lawrence Hospital, 457 West 163rd Street, at Edgecombe Avenue, Manhattan. The below 1905 photograph shows the Polo Grounds with the buildings of Edgecombe Avenue looming behind it. St. Lawrence Hospital may be in this picture, likely the building second from right along the top (to the right of the group of trees).
Library of Congress
WRITTEN BY JONATHAN GOLDMAN, AUGUST 17, 2020.
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