Joe DiMaggio Biography - Hometown Sensation, Off To A Fabulous Start, The Streak, Chronology, Postwar Comeback, Awards And Accomplishments
baseball player father giuseppe
1914-1999
American baseball player
One of the greatest of all baseball players, Joe DiMaggio played the game with grace (one of his nicknames was the Yankee Clipper), power (the other nickname was Joltin' Joe), and an all-around level of skill that few others have approached. His talent, combined with his desire to win and his team's sustained success, led to him become an icon of popular culture—the man who was considered baseball's greatest living player after his retirement.
The son of Sicilian immigrant parents, Joseph Paul DiMaggio was born in Martinez, California, a tiny East Bay village, on November 25, 1914. Named for his father, Giuseppe, he was the eighth of nine children. Not long after DiMaggio's birth the family moved to San Francisco where Giuseppe continued to ply his trade as a fisherman. DiMaggio grew up in the Italian neighborhood of North Beach, not far from Fisherman's Wharf where his father docked his boat. He attended public schools until age 16 whereupon he dropped out of Gallileo High School. By then he was already showing prowess as a baseball player as had his older brother, Vince. In fact, the last three DiMaggio siblings—Vince, Joe, and Dominic—would all become major league baseball players.
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From 1930 to 1932 DiMaggio resisted working on his father's boat, and after numerous odd jobs and a growing
Joe DiMaggio
reputation in San Francisco as a semi-pro baseball player, he signed late in the 1932 season to play for the San Francisco Seals of the Pacific Coast League (PCL). At that time the PCL was not a minor league but a highly regarded independent league, just a half-ste…
If the Rookie of the Year award had existed in 1936, there is no doubt that DiMaggio would have won it in the American League (AL). DiMaggio joined a Yankee team that had not won the league pennant since 1932 and was now led by first baseman Lou Gehrig. The sportswriters, always in search of a colorful angle, dubbed DiMaggio as the next Ruth on the strength of his incredible 1935 PCL season. But w…
DiMaggio was one of the leading performers, if not the leading performer of the incredible 1941 season. The Yankees won the AL pennant and went on to defeat the Brooklyn Dodgers in the World Series four games to one. (Within ten years Brooklyn would replace the New York Giants as National League archrival to the Yankees, before both NL teams decamped to the West Coast in 1958.) DiMaggio hit .357 i…
DiMaggio was stationed first in Southern California and later Hawaii and all told missed three full seasons from his prime athletic years, 1943-45. The Yankees still managed to win the AL pennant the first year he was gone and took sweet revenge on the Cardinals in the World Series. DiMaggio did not return until 1946 and when he did he was obviously rusty—or perhaps merely mortal. His batti…
Joe DiMaggio was our first modern media star, an athlete of extraordinary gifts and grace, a personage of regal dignity, an icon of American glamour. He was also the loneliest hero we have ever had. In the end, he was free of the crowds that cheered and revered him, the crowds that made his fortune and that he detested. He always hated it when fans would interrupt him in restaurants, stop him on t…
DiMaggio was an extremely private man who was nevertheless in the public eye. After retiring as a ballplayer he briefly worked as a Yankee announcer. In the late 1960s he served as a coach for the Oakland Athletics. In the 1970s he gained celebrity with a new generation as a spokesman for Mr. Coffee and the Bowery Savings Bank. DiMaggio was celebrated in song and literature both during his career …
Cramer, Richard Ben. Joe DiMaggio: The Hero's Life, New York: Simon & Schuster, 2000. Halberstam, David, Summer of '49, New York: William Morrow and Company, Inc., 1989. Johnson, Dick, ed. DiMaggio: An Illustrated Life, New York: Walker and Company, 1995. Kahn, Roger. Joe & Marilyn: A Memory of Love, New York: William Morrow and Company, Inc., 1986. New York Daily News.…
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Joe DiMaggio Biography - Hometown Sensation, Off To A Fabulous Start, The Streak, Chronology, Postwar Comeback, Awards And Accomplishments