This week in Philly history: The A’s, not the Phillies, brought home the city’s first World Series title

They packed the sidewalks, hat brim to hat brim, and hung on every pitch that was happening nearly 800 miles away.

A large group of Philadelphia baseball fans gathered outside the original Inquirer building at 1109 Market St. In this era before the wide-scale proliferation of the radio, fans received pitch-by-pitch updates from Chicago on the newspaper’s street-facing manual scoreboard.

On Oct. 23, 1910, in Game 5 of the Fall Classic, the crowd delighted as A’s pitcher Jack Coombs struck out two Cubs batters with the bases loaded in the third inning. The fans celebrated when the A’s scored five runs in the eighth. And then they rejoiced as the Philadelphia Athletics beat the Chicago Cubs, 7-2, clinching the series.

“We win the world’s championship,” fans exclaimed, according to The Inquirer.

The A’s, not the Phillies, brought home the city’s first World Series title.

The Phillies came first, counting 1883 as their first season in the National League. And then the A’s were established in 1901 in the American League, giving Philly two premiere baseball clubs.

But it was the A’s that found the most success, and at a faster clip.

The first World Series was played in 1903, and the A’s first reached it two years later in 1905, losing to the New York Giants.

But in that 1910 World Series, the A’s met the moment. Manager Cornelius McGillicuddy, better known as Connie Mack, used only two pitchers for the entire series: Coombs and Charles Albert “Chief” Bender. And the team’s famous “$100,000 infield,” featuring Eddie Collins, Jack Barry, and Frank “Home Run” Baker (they would later add Stuffy McInnes), supplied the runs and defense.

The team galvanized the city. Fans paid to sit on rowhouse rooftops that overlooked Shibe Park in the Swampoodle section of North Philadelphia, while the rest of the region followed the results closely in the daily newspapers. And those who couldn’t wait for the printing press stood outside the newspaper offices to follow the live results as they were wired in.

The 1910 win kicked off a dynastic run, with the A’s winning four A.L. pennants and three championships between 1910 and 1914. They’d go on a second run between 1929 and 1931, winning three pennants and two more world championships.

The A’s moved after the 1954 season to Kansas City, Mo., where they toiled for a spell before settling in Oakland. The team, in pursuit of a new stadium deal, is planning to move to Las Vegas in 2028.

But it will always be the team that brought Philadelphia its first World Series trophy.