1960s Timeline

July 3, 1962 - The Yankees put on a pyrotechnic display at the Stadium today. Paced by their famed M-M duo, they thrilled a crowd of 13,378 by exploding 5 home runs. Mickey Mantle and Roger Maris hit two apiece, and Bobby Richardson (left) hit the other. And yet, so tenaciously did Hank Bauer’s ninth-place Athletics fight back that the Bombers needed every last one of their homers before the 8-7 victory was theirs. As late as the eighth inning, the Yanks were trailing by thre

July 2, 1962 - The Yankees beat the Athletics, 8-4, today, but it wasn’t easy. Roger Maris, Mickey Mantle, and Hector Lopez hit homers at the Stadium and with Bill Stafford pitching beautifully for six innings, it looked for a while as if that would more than suffice to squelch Hank Bauer’s ninth-place Kansas City team. It took a lot more toil and sweat, however, before Ralph Houk’s Bombers finally put the Athletics down for keeps in the opener of a four-game series before 16

July 1, 1962 - The 1942 St. Louis Cardinals and New York Yankees, opponents in the world series that year, held an “old-timers” game before the start of the Cardinals-Pirates contest today, which the Pirates won, 7-2. The St. Louis Swifties, as the ’42 Cardinals were called, continued their mastery over the Yankees 20 years later by pounding out a 2-inning, 6-0 victory. Enos Slaughter’s two-run triple off the right-field wall was the longest drive. In the 1942 series, the Car

June 29, 1962 - Four Angel errors and a complete-game, 4-hit pitching performance by Whitey Ford led to a 6-3 Yankee triumph today. The victory extended the Yanks’ winning streak to three games, and they also drew to within a half-game of the front-running Indians, who bowed to the White Sox. Manager Ralph Houk’s defending champions picked up the run that won the game at the expense of pitcher Jack Spring in the seventh inning. A lead-off single by Tom Tresh (pictured) , a wa

June 27, 1962 - In the first two innings today at Yankee Stadium, the Bombers gained a five-run lead over the Minnesota Twins with a typical display of expertise and power. What followed was, for the most part, a dull affair. Before acute boredom set in among the more demanding spectators, the Bombers struck hard against fat left-handed pitches delivered by Jim Kaat. Tom Tresh (pictured) led off in the first inning with his fourth homer of the season, a drive deep into the le

June 24, 1962 - Jim Bouton (pictured) and Jack Reed, probably the most obscure players on the star-studded Yankees, were latecomers in today’s 7-hour, 22-inning victory over the Tigers. But they were the heroes. “I’ve never seen a run so hard to get,” said Reed, who clouted a 2-run homer for the Yankees’ 9-7 victory. Bouton, a rookie, entered the game in the 16th and held the Tigers to 3 hits through the 22nd. Yogi Berra, the 37-year-old star who should have been one of the m

June 24, 1962 - The Yankees and Tigers battled for 7 hours today, a major league record, before Ralph Houk’s Yanks won, 9-7, in 22 innings. With the score 7-7, Jack Reed (left), a utility outfielder who had entered the game in the 13th for defensive purposes, hit his first major league homer. The blow was struck off Phil Regan, Bob Scheffing’s seventh pitcher of the game, following Roger Maris’s walk. The Tigers strove to fight their way back in the last of the 22nd. But Jim

June 23, 1962 - The Yankees put in a long and arduous day in Detroit battling the Tigers in an afternoon and night program, gaining a split and a half game on the league-leading Indians. Off to a flying start on a first-inning grand slam by Yogi Berra (pictured with outfielder Jack Reed), Ralph Houk’s Bombers went on to win the afternoon game, 8-4, before a crowd of 16,454. But in the night encounter, Bob Scheffing’s Tigers responded to the roars of a crowd of 38,150 and trip

June 21, 1962 - Whitey Ford, long the bellwether of the Yankees pitching staff, returned today to his familiar role. Making his first start in almost two weeks, Ford gave only three hits in 8 and 2/3 innings as the world champions snuffed out the Orioles, 3-0. Even a crowd of 18,049 rabid Baltimore fans gave the southpaw a generous hand. The victory snapped a five-game losing streak for the Bombers. And with the Indians losing to the Red Sox, the Yanks moved back to within th

June 19, 1962 - Ralph Houk’s faltering world champion Yankees dropped the opener of a two-game series in Baltimore with the Orioles, 3-1. The crowd of 38,703 was the largest of the year in Baltimore Stadium. With Ralph Terry of the Yanks and Chuck Estrada of the O’s locked in a 1-1 tie, Brooks Robinson (pictured) sent Billy Hitchcock’s club ahead with a homer in the sixth. Two innings later, Robinson drove in another run, this time with a single that scored Estrada from secon

June 12, 1962 - The Yankees discovered an antidote today to Detroit’s Frank Lary, who has been pitching poison to them for years. Manager Ralph Houk turned Bill Stafford loose against the Tigers and the young righty proved even more venomous than Lary. Pitching shutout baseball until 2 were out in the last inning, Stafford topped Lary, 2-1. Bill allowed only six hits and walked no one. The victory put the Yanks in first place, and they stayed there when the Twins lost to the

June 11, 1962 - The Yankees, fighting to break a batting slump and remain in first place, and the Orioles, frustrated by their poor record, snapped under the strain at the Stadium today and produced one of the stormiest demonstrations in recent years at the old Bronx ballpark. An hour before the Orioles won the rubber match of the series, 5-3, home plate became a battleground for 20 angry players and their managers and coaches. A police lieutenant and two city patrolmen rushe

June 9, 1962 - Yogi Berra’s pinch-hit, 3-run homer in the seventh inning broke a 2-2 deadlock between the Yankees and the Orioles today and led to a 7-3 victory for the New Yorkers. The triumph extended the Yankee winning streak to five games. Bobby Richardson had put the American League leaders on even terms with the Orioles a minute earlier with a two-run clout off Steve Barber. It was Richardson’s first home run of the season and his fourth hit of the day. It was Berra’s d

June 7, 1962 - Of 93 pitches delivered by Bill Stafford (pictured) of the Yankees in tonight’s game at the Stadium, only two went for hits. As a result, it was relatively simple for the Yanks to blank the Indians, 4-0. The shutout was the Bombers’ second straight over Cleveland and their third victory in a row. It put the American League leaders one game ahead of the Minnesota Twins and dropped the Tribe to third place. During most of the contest, Jim Perry of the Indians was

June 3, 1962 - An 11-hit attack, including two homers by Elston Howard (left), enabled Ralph Houk’s Yankees to bring down the Angels, 6-3, today before a crowd of 44,912 in Los Angeles. The world champions thus took the 3-game series, 2-1. All told, the series drew 146,623 fans. The victory, coupled with the Indians’ defeat, lifted the Yanks into a first-place tie with the Tribe. Less happy is the report on Mickey Mantle. Even Mickey, prone as he is to minimizing his injuries

May 30, 1962 - The Yankees battled the Twins in a round-the-clock, morning-and-night marathon before a total of 75,355 fans today in Minnesota, but the best they could get was an even break. Ralph Houk’s Bombers, behind the slick pitching of Bill Stafford, took the morning game, 10-1. A three-run homer by John Blanchard (pictured right with Roger Maris and Luis Arroyo) put the skids under the Twins as early as the third inning. But in the night game, despite homers by Roger M

May 26, 1962 - Yankee bats suddenly lost their power today whenever a potential run reached base at Yankee Stadium. This unbecoming impotency stemmed directly from the fine left-handed pitching of Hank Aguirre (pictured right with manager Bob Scheffing and Rocky Colavito) as the Detroit Tigers scored a 2-1 triumph. An injury to Al Kaline on the last play of the game prevented Detroit’s fifth consecutive victory from being a happy occasion. The Tiger right fielder made a divin

May 23, 1962 - Maybe it was the sight of Mickey Mantle. Maybe it was Kansas City pitching. Attribute it to what you may, the Yankees snapped out of their scoring lethargy today with a resounding boom at Yankee Stadium. In their biggest inning of the season, the Bombers poured nine runs across the plate in the eighth. The thrust of the explosion projected them from three runs behind into a 13-7 victory over the Athletics. By winning, they preserved their narrow American League

May 23, 1962 - Released from Lenox Hill Hospital at noon, Mickey Mantle appeared in the Yankee dressing room on crutches at 1:15 p.m. today. He chatted with his teammates for a while, then remained to watch the game on television. Of the torn right thigh muscle he suffered last Friday night, Mickey said: “It just has to heal. It doesn’t feel too bad right now. I can walk without crutches if I drag the leg, but not if I bend it.” Mantle will take daily whirlpool treatment at t

May 22, 1962 - Life without Mickey Mantle continues to pose difficulties for Manager Ralph Houk and the Yankees. Tonight, it took the defused Bombers 12 innings to subdue the Los Angeles Angels, 2-1. The victory, in which four New York pitchers shared a one-hitter, enabled the Yankees to regain the American League lead. They are 13 percentage points ahead of the Minnesota Twins. Cleveland, which had been first, lost to Baltimore and dropped to third. In the game at Yankee Sta