The Homepage of the New York Yankees Babe Ruth's Memorial
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Biography:
George Herman Ruth, Jr. was born on February 6,1895, to George and Kate Schamberger. Babe was their first child out of eight. He was born in his grandparent’s house in Baltimore Maryland. But since in those days unfortunately there wasn’t great technology so most the children died as an infant. So only Babe and his sister Mamie survived.
Babes father was a bar tender and owner. George and Kate got to spend only a little time with their children because they spent long hours working. So people have came to the belief that Babe was an orphan, which he wasn’t. The first seven years of his life he was with his parent’s, but after that he had to survive the harsh and crowded streets of Baltimore riverfront himself.
George Jr had only experienced a little love if any from his parent’s because of the long hours they worked. But after a while Babe’s parents came to the conclusion that they could no longer care for their son. So when Babe was seven years old he was shipped out to St. Mary's Industrial School for Boys. This wasn’t the worst part, they also signed custody of Babe to the Xaverian Brothers, a Catholic Order of Jesuit Missionaries who ran St. Mary's.
The school that George had gone to was both a reformatory school and an orphanage , that looked like a prison with security guards. George wasn’t the only one in his school though at that time there was said to be about 800 children in St. Mary’s. There were four dormitories, which held 200 kids each. Babe by the age of seven years old had already been involved with mischievous altercations, was classified as "incorrigible" upon his admission. Some times George would get sent back home to live with his parent’s but then he was always directly sent back without out any visitors at his stay when he was at St Mary’s.
One of the best things at George, Jr. stay at St. Mary’s was meeting Brother Mathais. Brother Mathias was the main disciplinarian at St. Mary's. He spent long hours with George providing him with the love an guidance his parent’s did not give him, he also developed the baseball player inside young Babe Ruth. They say the only reason Babe got to love the other children is because of his difficult childhood and love from brother Mathais. This explains why he went out of the way doing things for children especially the ones in need.
At Babe’s school baseball was very popular. He had played very position on the field and was very skilled at pitching. He also was very good at hitting the ball. In Babe’s teen years he already started dreaming about making it to the major leagues. When Ruth was nineteen years old Jack Dunn, manager of the Baltimore Orioles, already signed him to his first professional baseball contract. At the time a minor league franchise in the International League. But since Babe’s parents had signed custody of him to St. Mary’s he wasn’t allowed to leave the school till 21 years old. So Jack Dunn became Babe’s legal guardian.
Jack Dunn Babes new guardian was well known for picking up youngsters who he thought had major league skills. So when George made his first appearance on the field the other players didn’t take to him to well. They started making jokes about him, and one of the players said, "Well, here's Jack's newest Babe." So that’s how Babe got his nickname. The other players then started calling him Babe, and that name stayed with him throughout his whole carrier.
Five months after being signed to the Baltimore Orioles, Babe was signed to a new team. The Boston Red Sox. His debut was at Fen way Park on July 1914 pitching against the Cleveland Indians.
Almost every morning Babe would go to Landers’ Coffee Shop, this is were he meet seventeen year old Helen Woodford a seventeen year old waitress their. They both got married on October 17, 1914 at St. Paul’s Roman Catholic Church in Ellicott City, Maryland. As Babe began to show off his talent by 1919 he was making $10,000 per year. So because of his salary he and his wife bought a house outside of Boston in Sudbury, Massachusetts.
Eventually Babe had gotten sold to the New York Yankees, at the time Colonel Jacob Ruppert owned the team, and was managed by Miller Huggins. When Ruth had arrived to New York the team instantly became a dominant force in the major leagues, they were unstoppable they won seven pennants and four World Series.
Babe and his wife had moved into Ansonia Hotel on Broadway in New York, which also many celebrities had stayed in. Babe’s wife Helen was very shy and reserved and did not like the constant moving. Because where ever Babe went she had to go too. So she went to go stay at their rural home back in Boston. At their home they had a farm, 200 Acres of land and a lot of privacy. In 1921 Babe and his wife Helen adopted a baby girl named Dorothy.
On January 11, 1929, at the age of 31, Helen died of suffocation in a fire. Dorothy, who was eight at the time, was away at boarding school.
After his wife’s death Babe had become interested in a young woman who had came to New York from Georgia, with a daughter named Julia who was an model and actress. So the twp were married on April 17, 1929, at St. Gregory’s the Great Roman Catholic Church in New York. They had gotten married the day before opening day against the Boston Red Sox at Yankee Stadium. As a present for Babe’s new wife named Claire he hit a home run on his first at bat. In October 1930 Clair had adopted Babe’s daughter Dorothy, and Babe had adopted Claries daughter Julia.
After Babe Ruth retired from baseball, he loved some other sports besides baseball like He had a passion for hunting and fishing, boxing, and bowling. But perhaps one of his biggest athletic passions was golf. Julia say’s if it weren’t for golf Ruth wouldn’t know what to do with himself.
People think because of Babe’s harsh child hood or the love he never really received from his real parent’s. But regardless of all of these reason’s Babe loves children and children love Babe. Everywhere Babe went children surrounded him he loved kids, and would do anything to help the children who need it most. He made to many count less visits to children in hospitals and orphanages in was unbelievable, and always did what was asked of him to help charitable causes associated with children. This even included St. Mary's. He never tried to hide his roots and difficult childhood, and once he became established he did much to help St. Mary's and the Xaverian Brothers who ran it.
Babe’s last year with the New York Yankees was in 1934. He wanted to manage the major leagues so badly. But at 40 years old he had announced that his playing days were through and he wanted to become a manager. In late February, Judge Emil Fuchs owner of the Braves made Ruth join their team making Ruth believe that he would be a manager a few years later. But that dream never came true for Babe. His last major league game was played on May 30, 1935 for the Boston Braves, and announced his retirement on June 2, 1935. From that day on he kept hoping to get a chance to manage in the major leagues, but the opportunity never came. On February 2, 1936, Babe became a charter member of the Baseball Hall of Fame.
In 1946 Babe Ruth was diagnosed with throat cancer. Even thought the doctors did everything they can to help him, nothing would work. The doctors could not do any more for him so he was released from the hospital on February 15, 1947. Subsequently, April 27 was declared "Babe Ruth Day" in every baseball park in the United States and Japan. Although too frail to don his old uniform at the time, Babe did make an appearance on that day at Yankee Stadium.
His final appearance at Yankee stadium was on June 13, 1948, during the 25th anniversary of "The House that Ruth Built." During the celebration the Yankees also retired his uniform, number 3, and for that reason Babe put on the uniform for one last time.
At 8:01 p.m. on August 16, 1948, Babe Ruth lost his battle with cancer. For two days, his body lay in state at the main entrance to Yankee Stadium. Hundreds of thousands of people stood in line to pay their last respects. Babe's funeral was on August 19 at St. Patrick's Cathedral in New York. He is buried at Gate of Heaven Cemetery in Hawthorne, New York. He now rests along side of his wife Claire who was buried next to him after her death in 1976.
Written by Angelo Presta
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