ON THIS DAY IN DODGERS HISTORY: JAN. 22

Posted by Ron on Jan 22, 2012 | 4 comments

JAN.  22, 1932:  The Brooklyn baseball team officially adopts the name Dodgers after local sportswriters vote for that moniker over the only other nameJ that comes up, the Kings.

            Here is the original story from the Brooklyn Daily Eagle of Jan. 23, 1932 under the headline:

“Brooklyn Base ball Club Will Officially Nickname Them ‘Dodgers’     Ebbets Field Leaves It to Writers, Who Choose Old “Handle’

By Thomas Holmes.

             Henceforth, the Brooklyn baseball club will officially be known as the Dodgers. This was decided at a meeting of the Brooklyn Chapter of Baseball Writers at Ebbets Field yesterday.

            The Brooklyn ball club has had no official nickname in its 41 years of existence in the National League although it has rumbled along under half a dozen semi-official aliases. Originally, the Brooklyn players were known as Bridegrooms. In Ned Hanlon’s time, the team Superbas. Along  about that time also, Charley Dryden nicknamed the club the Trolley Dodgers.   In recent years, “Robins” proved fairly popular, but with the end of Wilbert Robinson’s long reign as manager, that nickname lost most of Its significance.

            “Bridegrooms” and “Superbas” were unwieldly names. The weakness of “Robins” as a nickname was the name’s natural link to Wilbert Robinson. Through the  years, “Dodgers” has hung on pretty well. Since the passing of Mr. Robinson, there has been agitation in various quarters to settle upon a nickname that would be universal and un changing. Alive to the discussion, Ebbets Field last week notified the Brooklyn baseball writers, that it would officially adopt any nickname that the writers desired. Yesterday, the scribes voted for “Dodgers,” preferring it to “Kings.” which was the only other nickname that received serious  consideration.

            President Frank B. York and Treasurer Steve McKeever, notified of the decision, immediately announced that the 1932 uniform of the ball team would have “Dodgers” inscribed across the breast in large letters, thus leaving no doubt as to what the nickname of the team shall be.