This Day in Walter O’Malley History:

  • Leo Durocher, Dodger President Branch Rickey, and Dodger Vice President and General Counsel Walter O’Malley are in Pittsburgh on May 7, 1946 to discuss the club’s injunction enjoining Jorge and Bernardo Pasquel of the Mexican League from “unlawfully interfering” with the Dodgers by persuading Brooklyn players to break their contracts.

  • Walter O’Malley meets in his Brooklyn office with Jerry Hoffberger, head of National Brewing Company in Baltimore. Hoffberger, part of a group to bring the St. Louis Browns to Baltimore in 1953, subsequently became a majority owner and Chairman of the Baltimore Orioles, as part of the publicly-held Baltimore Baseball Club, Inc., until he sold the team to prominent Washington attorney Edward Bennett Williams in 1979. For more than 30 years, Hoffberger headed National Brewing Company.

  • In a public opinion survey taken in five major Los Angeles population areas and released by Facts Consolidated, an independent research firm, if the “Proposition B” referendum were voted on today, the city-wide percentage favoring the measure would pass 55.5% to 29.8%, with 14.7% undecided. Joe E. Brown, Chairman of the Taxpayers’ Committee for “Yes on Baseball” said, “The results of the poll are extremely gratifying to those of us who are working to assure the Dodgers a permanent home in Los Angeles.” Voters were to decide on June 3, 1958 if the previously approved contract between the Dodgers and the City of Los Angeles would remain in force.

  • A special exhibition game between the Dodgers and the New York Yankees was organized by Walter O’Malley as a tribute to legendary Dodger catcher Roy Campanella. A then major league record crowd of 93,103 attended the game, won by the Yankees 6-2, at the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum to greet the three-time N.L. MVP, who had never played a game in L.A. One of the most touching moments in sports occurred when the crowd was asked to say a prayer and light a match for Campy. With the house lights dimmed, the Coliseum then sparkled like thousands of fireflies. O’Malley agreed to pay the Yankees their travel expenses and $85,000, while he also provided one-half of the game’s proceeds to Campanella, in an arrangement whereby an account with the former catcher’s lawyer was established to monitor the funds.

  • Putting to rest rumors that Walter Alston would be fired as Dodger Manager before the end of the season and Coach Leo Durocher would replace the incumbent, Walter O’Malley emphatically declares to Associated Press, “Walter Alston is my manager and I have no intention of making a change.” The Dodgers were 12-14 at the time of the statement, but O’Malley added, “If there is any blame to be placed anywhere, maybe it should be hung on the general manager and myself. After all, we are the ones who supply Alston with the players. The season is just one month old and already we’ve had injuries to such key players as Tommy Davis, Maury Wills, Bill Skowron, Sandy Koufax and Johnny Podres. You certainly can’t blame that on the manager.” The Dodgers, under Alston’s leadership, bounced back from their sluggish start to finish the season with a 99-63 record and won the World Championship, sweeping four games from the New York Yankees.

  • Jim Murray of the Los Angeles Times writes a column titled “O’Malley Has Winning Formula — Own Course” about Walter O’Malley as the architect of a golf course at Dodgertown in Vero Beach, Florida stating, “O’Malley has this course down in Vero Beach and he couldn’t care less if (Arnold) Palmer birdies it. O’Malley’s design features are a lot more practical. What Walter does is study the form of the guys HE has to win money off of. Like, he carefully kept a log on where his partner Jim Mulvey’s average tee shots landed. When he had the spot triangulated to the nearest half a foot — he put a trap in there!...Only one opponent frustrates O’Malley — his wife, Kay. Kay’s game is not as predictably lousy as Walter’s other opponents.” Jim Murray, “O’Malley Has Winning Formula — Own Course,” Los Angeles Times, May 7, 1967

  • Walter O’Malley writes a letter to his friend Ed Bunker in Florida and describes an unusually tough day on the golf course. “Yesterday I played Bel Air (Country Club) in the Catholic Youth Organization (CYO) Tournament and in one hole I hit the concrete 4 times to wind up with a gross 15 which meant I might just as well have quit and gone home.”