For New Yorkers—especially Brooklynites—1957 will always be the year that lives in infamy. It was when the Brooklyn Dodgers and the New York Giants delivered a one-two punch to the city by both abandoning their hometown for California. Millions of bereft and angry baseball fans wondered how such a thing could be allowed to happen: Who was to blame? After poring relentlessly through archives, original news stories, and government documents, Robert Murphy gives the most fully-researched answer to that question yet offered. Packed with history, rich in baseball lore and legend, this is a book that any New York history buff and all lovers of America’s national pastime will relish.
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AFTER MANY A SUMMER reveals:
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How baseball commissioner Ford Frick helped facilitate the teams’ move to California
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Which plan for a new stadium would have appeased Dodgers owner Walter O’Malley—and saved Brooklyn baseball
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How Robert Moses, who has received much blame, actually tried to solve the problem
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How O’Malley and Giants owner Horace Stoneham worked in tandem to make sure their popular rivalry would continue in LA
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How the two owners managed to carry out secret talks with California officials even while insisting they had no plans to leave New York
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