Go-Go to Glory: The 1959 White Sox fetes A.L. champions on
50th anniversary
The 1959 White Sox broke a 40-year pennant drought on the city’s South Side. The scrappy Go-Go Sox, with pitching, fielding and timely hitting, finally overcame the New York Yankees’ dominance of the American League, only to lose to the Dodgers in the World Series.
On the 50th anniversary of the pennant-winning club, the book Go-Go to Glory: The 1959 Chicago White Sox pays tribute to the men of that team. Published by ACTA Sports, the volume is a Society for American Baseball Research (SABR) project and includes original biographies of all the players, coaches, broadcasters and key front-office personnel, and appreciations of the 1950s White Sox by fans and historians.
A number of other books on White Sox history cover a much wider scope than the 1959 club, but they do not have the biographical focus that this one features. The in-depth project gathers the collective efforts of more than 40 SABR members and friends of this nonprofit research society.
More information can be obtained at www.actasports.com or 773-271-1030.
Fifty years later: The legend of Big Klu still lives large
By Paul Ladewski Staff Writer
Posted June 9, 2009
The area once referred to as Argo is located eight miles west of old Comiskey Park, a decidedly blue-collar town known for a corn milling and processing plant that is among the largest of its kind. As the barely 10,000 residents would tell you, it has the odor to prove it, too.
But to many Chicago baseball fans, especially those on the South Side, the location is known for something of far greater significance. It also was home to Ted Kluszewski, the 6-foot-2, 225-pound mountain of a man with the famous 15-inch biceps, whose legend in White Sox history will live even longer than the home runs he hit decades ago. “I remember the first time that I saw Ted in those cut-off sleeves," former White Sox pitcher Billy Pierce still recalls his trademark style nearly a half century later. "They were good-sized. He was a big man. A big man."
Says Bill "Moose" Skowron, the former White Sox and New York Yankees first baseman who crossed paths with Big Klu many times in their careers. "Everybody knows Ted could hit a baseball. What some people don't know is that he was a helluva first baseman and a helluva nice guy, too. And he always played in those short-sleeve shirts. He was built like a rock, you know."
How can the South Side of Chicago ever forget? There Kluszewski will forever be remembered as one of the greatest Brinks jobs in White Sox history, a local boy who made very, very good one unforgettable season. In the 1959 World Series, Kluszewski hit .391, slugged three home runs and drove in 10 runs. His 1.266 OPS was just plain silly.
Kluszewski mashed two of the taters in an 11-0 rout of the Los Angeles Dodgers in the opener. "Oh, man, the two home runs that Ted hit . . .," Pierce smiles at the thought of them. "That was exciting. I mean, there we were in the World Series . . . the fans were excited, we were excited, everybody was excited."
To this day, witnesses will tell you that ol' Comiskey Park never rocked like it did in the moments after Kluszewski took reliever Chuck Churn for a ride to the upper deck in the fourth inning. The two-run blow not only sealed the deal, but it did much to chuck Churn, as it turned out. The pitch was his last in the big leagues.
