~Jimmy Archer 1883–1958 (Cubs 1909-1917) He was the regular Cubs catcher from 1911 to 1917, but Jimmy Archer was much more than that. He was an early version of television’s Steve Austin; the bionic Cub. During the winter of 1902, at the age of 1...

How Long Ago was 1908? The vast majority of games are umpired by only one man. This leads to what we would consider to be widespread cheating. Cubs third baseman Harry Steinfeldt is notorious for “accidentally tripping” players approaching ...

~Hank Borowy 1916–2004 (Cubs 1945-1948) He had won 17, 14, and 15 games in his three previous seasons with Yankees, and had already won 10 games in 1945 when the Cubs acquired Hank. Borowy was 29 years old and in the prime of his career. People t...

~Milt Pappas 1939–2016 (Cubs 1970-1973) Milt had some of his best seasons as a big league pitcher with the Cubs at the tail end of his career. In 1971 he became one of only ten pitchers in big league history to strike out the side on nine pitches...

~Jim Hickman 1937–2016 (Cubs 1969-1973) After eight forgettable seasons with three different teams, Jim Hickman was magically transformed from a perennial struggler to a powerful slugger. In 1970 at the age of 33, “Gentleman Jim” somehow batted ....

This week (May 10–May 16) during the last year the Cubs went to the World Series (before 2016)… World War II *Georgia welcomes back the famous General Courtney Hodges *The New York Times describes the damage in Germany this way: “Berl...

~Billy Jurges 1908–1997 (Cubs 1931-1938, 1946-1947) He was known as a fiery, ill-tempered, good fielding, weak-hitting shortstop for the Cubs, but he was also one of the team leaders during the best decade of the Cubs bad century (they were in th...

~Ross Barnes 1850–1915 (White Stockings 1876-1877) Barnes was an integral member of that first National League Cubs team (then known as the White Stockings). He was one of three players brought over from Boston by Al Spalding to stock that origin...

May 9, 1873 Future Chicago mayor Anton Cermak is born. Throughout the last century many of Chicago’s mayors have been White Sox fans (most notably the Daleys), but there have been a few notable exceptions, and Mayor Cermak may have been the most ...

~Mickey Doolin 1880–1951 (Cubs 1916) Doc, as he was known, was part of the first Cubs team to play at Wrigley Field. The previous season Doolin had also called the ballpark home–as a member of the Federal League Whales. When team owner Charles We...