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  • On this day in Florida history - August
    • Aug. 15, 1887 - Eatonville becomes one of first all-black towns in U.S.
    • Aug. 13, 2004 - Hurricane Charley kicks off unusually active 'cane year
    • Aug. 12, 1981 - Developed in Boca Raton, first PC released by IBM
    • Aug. 11, 1987 - Santeria church vows to sacrifice animals despite Hialeah ban
    • Aug. 10, 1981 - Tragic discovery confirms death of missing Adam Walsh, 6
    • Aug. 9, 1956 - Reporters look down noses covering Elvis in Daytona Beach
    • Aug. 8, 1896 - Cross Creek, Yearling author Marjorie Kinnan Rawlings born
    • Aug. 6, 1868 - Great Seal of the State of Florida adopted by Legislature
    • Aug. 5, 1763 - Britain takes over Pensacola, expands slavery over two-decade Fla. rule
    • Aug. 4, 1842: U.S. gives free Florida land to settlers willing to fight Seminoles
    • Aug. 1, 1939 - Florida Highway Patrol formed; to begin with 60 troopers
  • On this day in Florida history - July
    • July 31, 1962 - Actor, tax evader Wesley Snipes born in Orlando
    • July 30, 1956: Delta Burke, star of tabloids and television, born in Orlando
    • July 28, 1896: With railroad into town, city of Miami incorporated
    • July 27, 1816: U.S. forces obliterate 300+ free blacks, Indians at 'Fort Negro'
    • July 26, 1876 - Daytona incorporated, named after founder Matthias Day
    • July 25, 1884 - St. Petersburg Times debuts as West Hillsborough Times
    • July 25, 1957 - Country star, actress Pam Tillis born in Plant City
    • July 23, 1836 - Cape Florida Lighthouse attacked by Seminoles
    • July 22, 1964 - First 536 home lots sold in new city of Coral Springs
    • July 21, 1821 - St. Johns and Escambia become first two Florida counties
    • July 20, 1969 - U.S. astronauts walk on the moon
    • July 19, 1952 - Skynyrd guitarist Allen Collins is born; stardom and tragedy await
    • July 18, 1940 - Winners of St. Pete mayor's safety slogan contest announced
    • July 17, 1821 - Spain officially transfers Florida to United States
    • July 16, 1943 - Former 'Canes, Dolphins, Cowboys coach Jimmy Johnson born
    • July 15, 1997 - Killer gigolo guns down Gianni Versace at South Beach mansion
    • July 14, 1921 - Florida's most famous 'cracker cowboy' dies at 58
    • July 13, 1927: Officials dump $250k in liquor into Gulf Stream
    • July 10, 1972 - First of two major party conventions opens in Miami Beach
    • July 9, 1957 - Pass-a-Grille and three other towns form St. Pete Beach
    • July 8, 2011 - Last space shuttle launched from Cape Canaveral
    • July 7, 1983 - 'Operation Everglades' drug bust rocks Everglades City
    • July 6, 2003 - 'Hillbillies' star Buddy Ebsen, raised in Orlando, dies at 95
    • July 5, 1928 - Elks begin arriving for 1st Florida national convention
    • July 4: Florida celebrates America's Independence Day
    • July 3, 1971 - Doors singer, Melbourne native Jim Morrison dies
    • July 2, 1961: Key West icon Ernest Hemingway dies; cats live on
    • July 1, 1951: St. Pete woman's burning death baffles investigators
  • On this day in Florida history - June
    • June 1, 1937 - Amelia Earhart leaves Miami to begin final voyage
    • June 2, 2008 - Bo Diddley, 79, dies at his home in Archer
    • June 3, 1961 - Arrest made in case that leads to 'right to an attorney'
    • June 4, 1939 - Jewish refugee ship turned away from Florida coast
    • June 5, 2013 - Zephyrhills woman, 84, claims $590 million Powerball jackpot
    • June 6, 1990 - Broward Judge rules 2 Live Crew album 'obscene'
    • June 7, 1928 - Two elections workers shot in Tampa ballot box heist
    • June 8, 1888 - First train rolls into terminus "St. Petersburg"
    • June 9, 1903 - Flagler's Breakers Hotel burns down in Palm Beach
    • June 10, 1991 - South Florida learns it will get new major league baseball team
    • June 11, 1953 - Sabal Palmetto palm becomes Florida's state tree
    • June 12, 1913: With first bridge, Miami Beach is open for business
    • June 13, 1974 - Askew appoints first female Cabinet member
    • June 14, 1966 - FSL's Miami and St. Pete set record for longest baseball game
    • June 15, 1822: City of Jacksonville founded, named after Andrew Jackson
    • June 16, 1955 - Judge Chillingworth and wife go missing
    • June 17. 1942 - German U-boat saboteurs land at Ponte Vedra Beach
    • June 18, 1983 - Sally Ride becomes first American woman in space
    • June 19, 1972 - Hurricane Agnes makes landfall in Panhandle
    • June 20, 2003 - Non-profit Wikipedia established in St. Petersburg
    • June 21, 1926 - Miami barbers don't want to be called 'chirotonsors'
    • June 22, 1990 - Florida bans thong bikinis in state parks
    • June 23, 1938 - Marine Studios, 'world's first oceanarium,' opens
    • June 24, 1987 - S. Fla's most famous resident, Jackie Gleason, dies at 71
    • June 25, 1981 - Dolphins QB Bob Griese retires after 14 seasons
    • June 26, 1964 - Governor orders extra police to riot-torn St. Augustine
    • June 27, 1964 - State tells Daytona: Stop price-gouging your tourists
    • June 28, 1911 - Big Cypress Indian Reservation created by President Taft
    • June 29, 1931 - Monticello hits 109 degrees -- hottest-ever for Florida
    • June 30, 1975 - Cher marries Daytona Beach's favorite son Gregg Allman
  • On this day in Florida history - May
    • May 1, 1562 - Jean Ribault arrives at St. Johns River, claims Florida for France
    • May 2, 1936 - Panama City Beach incorporated in Bay County
    • May 3, 1901 - Jacksonville burns to the ground
    • May 4, 1990 - Execution goes awry as flames, smoke shoot from head
    • May 5, 1961 - Alan Shepard becomes first American in space
    • May 6, 1965 - Rolling Stones play Clearwater, write 'Satisfaction' riff
    • May 7, 1940 - Voting machine shortages create long wait at polls
    • May 8, 1923 - Killings of work camp prisoners detailed in hearing
    • May 9, 1981 - Sinkhole swallows house, five Porsches in Winter Park
    • May 10, 1781 - Spanish Gen. Bernardo de Gálvez captures Pensacola
    • May 11, 1996 - ValuJet Flight 592 crashes into Everglades
    • May 12, 1997 - Tornado hits Miami, poses for photos, videos
    • May 13, 1955 - Jax fans chase Elvis after show, tear off his clothes
    • May 14, 1973 - Skylab launches new era of space study...and toys
    • May 15, 1947 - Florida State College for Women goes co-ed, renamed FSU
    • May 16, 1929 - Lake City mob lynches grocer after wife shoots chief
    • May 17, 1980 - Not guilty verdict triggers three days of rioting in Miami
    • May 18, 1955 - Educator Dr. Mary McLeod Bethune dies
    • May 19, 2004 - Drugstore chain owner Jack Eckerd dies at 91
    • May 20, 1913: Henry Morrison Flagler dies in his home at Palm Beach
    • May 21, 1956 - Police close beach after catching black, white teens talking
    • May 22, 1931 - Canned rattlesnake goes on sale from Arcadia
    • May 23, 1898 - School for Deaf & Blind issues first diplomas
    • May 24, 1931 - Writer develops Planet of the Apes storyline for Miami
    • May 25, 1961 - JFK challenges nation to land on moon within decade
    • May 26, 1845 - Florida holds first statewide election
    • May 27, 1965 - Mysterious land deal near Orlando revealed
    • May 28, 1935 - Now controversial "Old Folks At Home" becomes state song
    • May 29, 1967 - Woman jailed after 25 kids found in station wagon
    • May 30, 1989: Claude Pepper dies after 60 years of public service
    • May 31, 1539 - DeSoto comes to Florida, changes continent forever
  • On this day in Florida history - April
    • April 1, 1926 - Air Mail service begins in four Florida cities
    • April 2, 1513 - Juan Ponce de Leon lands in Florida
    • April 3, 2006 - Gators basketball team win first-ever national title
    • April 4, 1933 - NASCAR 2nd generation leader Bill France Jr. is born
    • April 5, 1925 - 'Great Miami Tornado' kills 5, destroys 250 homes
    • April 6, 1959 - Seminole Tribe votes to support building "Alligator Alley"
    • April 7, 1890 - Author, Everglades crusader Marjorie Stoneman Douglas born
    • April 8, 1923 - News of "lost" Tamiami trail blazers heats up
    • April 9, 1921 - Whites kicked out of West Palm Beach "colored" town
    • April 10, 1766 - John Bartram ends journey through Carolinas, Ga., Florida
    • April 11, 1986 - FBI shootout in Dade prompts cops' need for more powerful guns
    • April 12, 1981 - Space Shuttle launched for first time
    • April 13, 1951 - Marion County sheriff killed by forged check suspect
    • April 14, 1528 - Bumbling conqueror Pánfilo de Narváez lands near Tampa
    • April 15, 1896 - Henry Flagler's railroad arrives in Miami for first time
    • April 16, 1915 and 1917 - Aviation takes two steps forward
    • April 17, 1961 - U.S. launches failed Bay of Pigs invasion in Cuba
    • April 18, 1957 - Florida to U.S.: Integration ruling unconstitutional
    • April 19, 1930 - First Publix store incorporated in Winter Haven
    • April 20, 1967 - Orange Juice becomes official state beverage
    • April 21, 1924 - NY's infamous 'Bobbed Haired Bandit' caught in Jax
    • April 22, 2000 - Elian Gonzalez seized in raid, returned to Cuba
    • April 23, 1982 - Keys secede from Union, create Conch Republic
    • April 24, 1965 - Orlando honors hometown astronaut with John Young Day
    • April 25, 1966 - Gov. Haydon Burns says his plane trailed by UFO
    • April 26, 1920 - Crop shippers seizing ice, creating shortage
    • April 27, 1969 - 1,000 students help during FSU admin building fire
    • April 28, 1985 - World's tallest sand sculpture built at Treasure Island
    • April 29, 1980 - U.S. braces for magnitude of Mariel Boatlift
    • April 30, 1915 - Broward County created, named after former governor
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Picture
Picture
Picture

Casey Stengel
was a Daytona Beach
troublemaker

The future Yankees manager caroused, got sick, threatened suicide, and orchestrated a 'bloody' grapefruit prank when he trained in Daytona during his playing career 
Picture
Casey Stengel trained in Daytona Beach when he played for the Brooklyn Dodgers
By Denny Bowden
Volusia History - Retracing

Florida's Past
Casey Stengel showed up for spring training in Daytona in 1915, 20 pounds under his playing weight after a hospital stay for typhoid fever that nearly killed him. He was still so weak that he couldn’t participate in the workouts at City Island Ball Park and didn’t even suit up for nearly a month.

 On the bridge, Stengel muttered, 
'I was trying to get up the guts to jump off into the deep water.'

   Finally, one night at midnight, Casey Stengel slumped over the edge of Daytona’s South Bridge, a wooden trestle bridge that spanned the Halifax River just to the south side of tiny City Island, which was barely larger than the baseball park back then in 1915. Stengel was only 25, but that seemed already too many years because he was facing career failure, debilitating illness, and likely public shame that he wouldn’t be able to stomach.

   Just then about 50 yards onto the bridge beyond City Island, the dim headlights of New York Press sportswriter George Underwood’s “19-teens” motorcar flashed across the lone figure standing in the dark, ready to plunge into the river. Underwood was returning from crossing the river from Daytona Beach (on the beachside) to Daytona (on the mainland) where he had wired his baseball story by Western Union late at night to New York City. Underwood stopped and recognized Casey Stengel, the young Dodger outfielder who was in Daytona for spring training. Stengel’s team couldn’t all be housed at the team’s hotel, so he was one of the players assigned to unsupervised private boardinghouses, leaving him free to “sport” without his manager or teammates to keep him in line. Stengel was a bachelor and a party boy who loved to go out nights.  He was 25, and there was nothing to keep him from cheap drink and cheap women.

   Sports historian Fred Lieb, author of Baseball as I Have Known It, recounts that Underwood asked Stengel what he was doing out on the bridge at midnight. “If Uncle Robbie [the Brooklyn manager] hears of it, he’ll slap a good fine on you,” Underwood said.

   Stengel muttered, “I was trying to get up the guts to jump off into the deep water.”

   Underwood asked, “Whatever gave you such a crazy idea?”

   “Well, I’m not hitting. . . Besides, Uncle Robbie doesn’t like me. And I’ve got the clap.”

   If Underwood hadn’t driven onto the South Bridge by City Island that midnight, Casey Stengel might have been buried in Pinewood Cemetery on the beachside.

   Baseball fans may remember Fred Lieb as a character in the classic Lou Gehrig baseball movie, The Pride of the Yankees (Lieb was portrayed by Walter Brennan). He was also the sportswriter who coined the unforgettable name for Yankee Stadium–”The House That Ruth Built.”

   Lieb’s account of Stengel’s near suicide in Daytona in 1915 was not published until six decades later in 1977, after Stengel had died and when Lieb was nearly 90 years old.

Stengel’s Unmentionable Illness in Daytona

   Stengel’s death-struggle with typhoid was rather common in the U.S. back then. In fact, at the time Stengel was languishing at City Island Ball Park, out in Texas several New York Giants ballplayers were hit with typhoid, and their manager ordered the whole team vaccinated. Even so, Stengel’s problem was more than typhoid – he’d become infected with gonorrhea, likely from somewhere in Daytona. He apparently hadn’t come to town with it because although symptoms usually show up within a week or so, Stengel didn’t have any signs of it until about the time he suited up, nearly a month after coming to spring training at City Island.

   Many years later, Garry Schumacher, a sportswriter who followed the Yankees, suggested that the reason that Stengel became known later in his career for keeping his distance from the women groupies who were so eager to be with pro baseball players was likely because “he had a little of that Cupid’s Catarrh when he was a young fellow, and it made him a little shy ever since.” 

   Before Stengel’s interrupted midnight appointment with death on Daytona’s South Bridge, he was likely the instigator of one of baseball’s most legendary pranks.

Stengel’s Legendary Baseball Prank at City Island Ball Park

   Stengel had been drafted by the Dodgers in 1912, and because he always talked about his hometown, Kansas City, Missouri, his teammates began calling him “KC,” which became “Casey” (probably because of the poem "Casey at the Bat").

   When Stengel came to Daytona in 1915 for spring training with the Brooklyn Dodgers, he had a new manager, Wilbert Robinson, who was almost 53 but still saw himself as a catcher of heroic ability; and when the new manager was reminded that in 1908 the Washington Senators catcher Charles “Gabby” Street had caught a baseball released from a window near the top of the Washington Monument, Robinson boasted that he could do even better – he could catch a baseball dropped from an airplane from the same height –525 feet.  So Stengel and other members of the team bet that their manager couldn’t do it.

  Robinson, who was later voted into the Hall-of-Fame in 1945, had played on the 1890s “old Orioles,” a hard-living, hard-playing, rough-and-tumble team.  

It was Stengel's idea to drop, not a 5-ounce baseball, but a huge, juicy, one-pound, ruby red Florida grapefruit from a height of at least 525 feet.

   At 5-feet 8 1/2-inches, Robinson had ballooned from his 170-pound playing weight to 250.

   Robinson’s airplane stunt would bring good publicity to the team who had been called Trolley Dodgers and then just Dodgers when they opened the new Ebbets Field in Brooklyn in 1913.  But sportswriters and fans were calling the team the Robins in honor of the manager Wilbert Robinson, so, no doubt, he wanted to live up to the team’s new nickname.
Picture
Ormond Beach daredevil pilot Ruth Law in her biplane. Photo: State Archives of Florida, Florida Memory
Woman Daredevil Pilot
of Ormond Beach

   Plans were made for Ruth Law, a daredevil biplane stunt pilot from Ormond Beach, to fly over City Island Ball Park.  It would be an easy feat for Law, an expert aviator.  She had purchased her first plane three years earlier from Orville Wright, and the year before this baseball park fly-over, the New Smyrna Beach News reported that she “has given her word that she will conquer the air at night or die in the attempt.”  Ruth Law was good to her word, becoming the first woman ever to fly an airplane at night.

   By the time of the spring training prank in 1915, Ruth Law was making daily flights in the area, dropping golf balls as a publicity gimmick for a local golf course, and reservations were being taken at the beachside Clarendon Hotel for passengers to fly with her in her “air machine.” 

   In 1915, it was already a tradition to open spring training by having a public figure or celebrity toss the baseball from the grandstand out to the catcher, but Robinson’s plan for their March 13 opener at City Island Ball Park would outclass even Gabby Street’s Washington Monument stunt.

   An account by baseball historian Josh Pahigian said “the hum of a plane could be heard within minutes of practice starting” and Robinson positioned himself “in the center of the diamond” to make the catch, but “Stengel appeared to have second thoughts."

  "He told his manager it wasn’t too late to call off the wager and warned that a ball falling from such height might rip a hole through Robinson’s glove and cause serious injury to him. But the proud manager wouldn’t back down."

The 525-foot Catch

   The pilot took two baseballs aloft and flew over the wide Halifax River, closing in on tiny City Island which was so small back then that a home run could clear the playing field (which had no outfield fence) and roll into the river. At a speed of at least 50 miles per hour, Law dropped the first baseball from her biplane, but Robinson was unable to catch it, so she circled and dropped the second ball, but the portly former-catcher missed it, also. At least, this is how the newspaper account reported the inaugural baseball tosses.

   Years later, though, the way prankster Casey Stengel told it, he was in the second seat with the pilot; and it was his idea to drop, not a 5-ounce baseball, but a huge, juicy, one-pound, ruby red Florida grapefruit from a height of at least 525 feet.

The Catcher’s “Bloody” Catch

   Robinson, of course, had no idea what was befalling him, so he stood his ground and positioned himself under the cascading “ball” so it would plop into his open catcher’s mitt, which in those days was small and had very little padding. Suddenly, at impact, according to the Sporting News, the “ball” smashed into his mitt and exploded with a loud bang, knocking Robinson to the ground as all the team and spectators watched.

   The grapefruit instantly soaked Robinson with juice and pulp and ricocheted off his face. One report says he was knocked unconscious.

   The crash was so explosive that Robinson thought he had lost an eye.  He felt great pain in the eye – from the grapefruit juice – and he could feel his “blood” splattered all over him. He screamed for help, yelling, “Help me, lads, I’m covered with my own blood.”

   Another account says Robinson cried out, “I’m killed! I’m dead! My chest’s split open! I’m covered with blood!"

 The grapefruit “tore through him like a cannonball,” as an unnamed Tampa Tribune blogger recently described.

   Forever after this, Robinson called airplanes “fruit flies.”  Two years later during World War I, Ormond Beach daredevil pilot Ruth Law became “the first woman to wear an Army Airs Corps uniform” even though she was not permitted to fly combat missions. 

   The legend began in Daytona at what is now Jackie Robinson Ball Park, and thanks to this prank, many people 99 years later still refer to spring training in Florida as “The Grapefruit League.”

Denny Bowden, Ph.D., writes about Volusia County history on the blog,
Volusia History - Retracing Florida's Past.
His work is reposted here by permission.
Read more of his Denny's blogs at 
http://volusiahistory.wordpress.com/

Previous posts
True Stories about The Real McCoy
Daytona's Deadliest Air Crash: Aug. 10, 1937
Zora Neale Hurston's unsung years on Florida's east coast
Florida's Worst Freezes
Washtub Baths and Pot-bellied Stoves in 1930s Florida
Annie Oakley was nearly crushed to death near Daytona Beach
Before the Seminoles, Timucuans dominated northern Florida
The ghost settlement of Freemanville
Daytona Beach ends Stan Musial's pitching career
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How Daytona Beach teens' lives changed during World War II