The Brooklyn Dodgers win their first (and only) World Series - October 4th, 1955

On this day in 1955, in a surprising upset, the Brooklyn Dodgers won the World Series, beating the New York Yankees 2-0.

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Episode Transcript

Speaker 1 (00:00):
This Day in History Class is a production of I
Heart Radio. Hello and Welcome to This Day in History Class,
a show that explores the past one day at a time.
I'm Gay Bluesier, and today we're talking about the time

(00:20):
when the original underdogs of baseball banded together and finally
pulled out a win. The day was October four nine.
In a surprising upset, the Brooklyn Dodgers won the World Series,

(00:43):
beating the New York Yankees too to zero. The win
had been a long time coming for both the team
and its long suffering fans. The Brooklyn Dodgers, formerly known
as the Trolley Dodgers, had lost the World Series seven
times since nineteen sixteen, with five of those losses delivered

(01:05):
courtesy of the New York Yankees. By nineteen fifty five,
the team had established a reliable, if not discouraging pattern.
They would chalk up win after win all season long,
make it to the World Series, and then get trounced
by the Yankees. But finally, just once, during their eighth

(01:28):
shot at the title, the gods of baseball took pity
on the Dodgers and delivered them a long awaited win.
The first six games of that year's series had adhered
to the old idea of home team advantage. The Yankees
carried all three games at Yankee Stadium in the Bronx,

(01:48):
and the Dodgers won all three games at Ebbott's Field
in Brooklyn. And since the final match was to be
held on the Yankees home turf, and in light of
the two teams lopsided history, the expectation was that the
pattern would hold and the Dodgers cross town rivals would
be victorious yet again, But there were early signs that

(02:10):
the game might not play out as expected. In the
fourth inning, the Dodgers scored the first run of the
game when catcher Roy Campanella hit a double and teammate
Gil Hodges hit a single to send Roy home. In
the sixth inning, the Dodgers managed to load the bases,
thanks in part to a crucial Yankee error. With the

(02:32):
pressure on, Gil Hodges came through again, hitting a fly
ball to center field and giving Dodgers shortstop and captain
Peewee Reese enough time to make it home. In the
bottom of the six the Dodgers were winning by two,
but their lead was hanging by a thread. The Yankees
had two runners on base with nobody out. That's when

(02:56):
Yogi Berra knocked an outside pitch straight down the left
field foul line. It seemed like the kind of hit
that would surely send both runners home, tying the game
at two to two, but that's not what happened. Instead,
Dodgers outfielder Sandy A. Morros made a miraculous catch and

(03:16):
got the ball to first base, canceling out the Yankees
double play. The Dodgers held onto their lead, and in
the bottom of the ninth, the Yankees were at bat
with two outs. In the game's pivotal moment, Elston Howard
hit a groundball to Peewee Reese. Reese, who had been
with the Dodgers through all five of their World Series losses,

(03:40):
later commented the quote, it seemed to take hours to
pick up that ball, but in reality he scooped it
up in the blink of an eye and sent it
flying to first base, where trusty old Gil Hodges caught
it in time to win the game. More than sixty
two thousand fans watched the Dgers win in person, and

(04:01):
even more watched it at home and in color. To boot,
as this was the first championship ever to be televised
in color. Brooklyn took on a carnival atmosphere that night,
with people dancing in the streets, blowing horns, and of course,
setting a few celebrational fires. In hindsight, the celebration seems

(04:23):
bitter sweet, because the nineteen fifty five World Series proved
to be the only one the Brooklyn Dodgers whatever win.
In nineteen fifty six, things went back to status quo,
with the Dodgers making it to the Series again, only
to lose to the Yankees. The year after that, in
nineteen fifty seven, the team's owner decided to ditch everyone's

(04:47):
least favorite burrow in favor of a fancy news stadium
in sunny California. The move came as a harsh blow
to the residents of Brooklyn, but it likely did wonders
for the players more owl as of the Los Angeles
Dodgers have won the championship five times and counting. I'm Gay,

(05:10):
Bluesier and hopefully you now know a little more about
history today than you did yesterday. If you enjoyed today's show,
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have any feedback you'd like to share, you can leave
us a review on Apple Podcasts, or right to the

(05:32):
show at this day at i heeart media dot com.
Thanks to Chandler Mays for producing the show, and thank
you for listening. I'll see you back here again tomorrow
for another day in History class. For more podcasts from

(05:53):
my Heart Radio, visit the I Heart Radio app, Apple Podcasts,
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