Depression+Era+Sports

(Adam H, Nate, Richard, Joey, Ben, Lucero, Jamie)

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Basketball was a small sport and mostly just started during the 1920s. there were multiple leagues and with such low attendance for every successful team there was 20 failures. The only time there was any high attendance was when there wasn’t a football game or Hockey game. Teams that were succeeding were the Celtics, Rens, and the SPHA’s. This all changed in 1925 when the creation the American Basketball League formed or ABL for short.=====

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The ABL was made up of teams that were owned by small corporations, like some of the early teams including the SPHA’s and the original Celtics. Early after that two other teams joined the league named the Boston Whirl Winds and Cleveland Rosenblum’s. Since small corporations owned the teams the games were first played sparingly. Half way the first season the Celtics dropped out to start brainstorming again. This gave the chase for the first title wide open. The Rosenblum’s won the first title. The next season yet again the Brooklyn Celtics joined the league. Celtics would then win the title for both years of 1927 and 1928. They then dropped out of the league again. Rosenblum’s would win the next two years then of 1929 and 1930. With the onset of the great depression most of the teams disbanded while the ABL tried to stay afloat, but with the shortage of food, and money people couldn’t enjoy the luxury of a basketball game. The league then suspended the seasons of 1931-1933 until they would have more demand and consumers to come and enjoy the basketball games.=====

**Negro Baseball during the Great Depression**
Before 1947, African Americans were not allowed to play in Major League Baseball. Negro League baseball was created in 1885, witch allowed African Americans to play baseball.

The Great Depression hit the baseballs Negro Leagues hard. The stock market crash took almost all the money the National and American Negro Leagues had, making it impossible from the teams mangers to pay their players.

In 1932, eight teams remained in the Negro Leagues for one last year of baseball. By mid-season, over half the teams went bankrupt, and the 1932 season was over. After baseball was shut down, sandlot games were held for fun and for people's entertainment.

About a year or so later, Gus Greenlee, a bar owner in Pittsburgh, formed the new Negro National League. The 1933 season had over seven teams and lured more than 7,000 fans to each game. Gus's own team, the Pittsburgh Crawfords, were arguably the best team to ever play in the Negro Leagues. At the end of the season, Gus Greenlee held the first ever Negro League All-star game.

Four years after the Gus Greenlee reformed the Negro National League, the Negro American League was formed brining seven more teams to baseball.

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For the rest of the Great Depression Negro baseball stayed strong with no signs of stopping. (In 1947 the Negro Leagues was ended when Jackie Robinson Broke the color barrier after being drafted by the Brooklyn Dodgers.) =====

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The 1936 Summer Olympics were known as the Games of the XI Olympiad. The games were held in Berlin, Germany. There was 49 nation's that participated in this event, with 3,963 athlete's 3,632 were men, and 331 women. The 1936 Summer Olympic games where the first games to be on live television, they where also second to use Olympic Flame. Jesse Owens won 4 gold medals in the sprint and long jump events. His competitor Luz Long he was awarded the Pierre de Coubertin medal for sportsmanship. Glenn Edgar Morris won a gold medal in the Decathlon. Rower Jack Beresford won his fifth Olympic medal in sports and third gold medal. Sohn Kee-chung and Nam Sung-yong both won medals in the marathon. British India has once again won the gold medal in field hockey. Rie Mastenbroek won 3 gold medals and 1 silver medal for swimming. Estonia's Kristjan Palusalu won 2 gold medals for men's wrestling. El Touni broke the middle class weightlifting record lifted a total of 387.5 kg. His record last for 13 years then somebody beat it. Germany won the Olympics with a total of 89 medals. The United States won second with a total of 56 medals. Hungary had won third with a total of 22 medals.

** The Winter Olympics where held in 1936 in the market town of Garmisch-Partenkirchen in Bavaria, Germany. The same place where the 1936 Summer Olympics where hold. That was the last year that both winter and Summer Olympics would be held at the same place. Karl Ritter von Halt organized the Winter Olympics on the behalf of the Sports Office of the Third Reich. There were 28 nations’ that took part of these games, including 646 athletes 566 were men and the other 80 were women. Willy Bogner a German skier took the Olympic oath during the opening ceremonies. Alpine skiing made its first view in the winter Olympics as the combined. Franz Pfnür won the men's alpine and Christl Cranz won the women's alpine events both are German athletes. Ivar Ballangrud won 3 out of four speed skating races. Sonja Henie won her third medal for women figure skating. Switzerland won the 4-man bobsled at a time of 5:19.85. The country Norway won the overall games coming home with 7 gold medals, 5 silver medals and 3 bronze medals. These medals were the largest and heaviest awarded, they were 100 mm diameter, 4 mm thick, and 324 grams. The top 3 places were Norway in 1st with 15 medals, Germany in 2nd with 6 medals, and Sweden coming in 3rd with 7 medals.
 * Winter Olympics:

Richard C.
Some of the old ballparks teams played in were the Old Yankee Stadium, were the New York Yankees played. There was also the famous Polo Grounds were the New York Giants played from 1883 to 1957, the New York Mets played there for 2 years until they built Shea Stadium. The New York Yankees also played there until they built Yankee Stadium in 1923. Also the Boston Braves played in Fenway Park until they moved to Milwaukee and then Atlanta. Wrigley Field is where the Cubs played during the Great Depression, it was called Cubs Park when they played there.
 * The Old Ballparks**

Some of the greatest players in Baseball history played during the Great Depression. Players such as Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Ted Williams, Lefty Grove, and Frankie Frisch. The most dominant team in the Great Depression Era were the New York Yankees. They won 6 world series in the Depression Era, including 4 in a row from 1936-1939. The New York Yankees had some of the greatest players of all time playing fro their team. Babe Ruth, and Lou Gehrig, two of the greatest players during the Great Depression Era hit back to back. Ted Williams was the first player in MLB history to bat .400 in a season. Ted Williams also hit for power, in 1941 Williams hit .406, 37 home runs, and 120 RBI's. In that year, he also was walked 147 times.
 * The Players and Teams**

Seabiscuit
Hard Tack was certainly bred like a champion. His dam, Tea Biscuit, was sired by the great Rock Sand, who won the English Triple Crown and was one of the top sires in the country. His second dam, Tea's Over, produced the champion Ort Wells and the good mare Toggery, who produced several stakes winners. Tea's Over was by the great Hanover. Hard Tack was sired by the immortal Man o' War himself. Yet due to a difficult temperament, Hard Tack was only a modest stakes winner, earning a mere $16,820 before bowing a tendon. In 1933 his book included only a handful of mares, including the well bred but poorly made broodmare Swing On, who had also done nothing to distinguish herself on the racetrack. Only her pedigree made her worth breeding at all. A daughter of the great Whisk Broom II, she was from the same female family as two-time Horse of the Year Equipoise, then at the height of his career. Equipoise was out of Swinging. Swing On was out of Balance. Both were out of Balancoire II. Swing On was later the third dam of Kentucky Derby winner Determine. On May 23, 1933, Swing On had a bay colt by Hard Tack who was later named Seabiscuit. He grew up on Claiborne Farm, with his age mates including Flares, Snark, Tintagel, Forever Yours, and Granville. Snark and Seabiscuit were among the horses bred by Mrs. Gladys Phipps' Wheatley Stable, and when she came to inspect her yearlings in April of 1934, Bull Hancock had Seabiscuit hidden away, knowing she wouldn't be impressed. He was undersized, knobby, and refused to shed his winter coat. Twenty one years later Bull Hancock hid another yearling from Mrs. Phipps. That was the accident prone Bold Ruler.