San Diego's First Padres and "The Kid": The Story of the Remarkable 1936 San Diego Padres and Ted Williams' Professional Baseball Debut

The year was 1936. The Depression was at its height. San Diego--then considered nothing more than a sleepy border town--had always desired to become a "big city." Securing a major professional baseball franchise would be the first step in fulfilling this dream.

Finally, San Diego took that first step by securing a team in the fabled Pacific Coast League. After a community-wide contest, the team was christened the San Diego Padres. That team turned out to be not only an interesting ballclub, but also a very good one. In retrospect, the club was even more remarkable. Two of its players--Bobby Doerr and Ted Williams, aka "The Kid"--became members of the Natinal Baseball Hall of Fame. They had one of the DiMaggio brothers roaming the outfield. Another outfielder played alongside Babe Ruth on the 1927 Yankees. To quote Bobby Doerr: "It was quite a team."

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TOM LARWIN was born and raised on Chicago's south side as a die-hard Cubs fan, but after moving to San Diego in 1976 he now shares his allegiance with the home-town Padres. He has written on "The 1907 Pacific Coast Baseball Championship Series" (The National Pastime, 2000) and heads up SABR's San Diego Ted Williams Chapter. He, along with Carlos and Dan, participated as authors in the book The Kid: Ted Williams in San Diego (Rounder Books, 2005).

CARLOS BAUER published several books on Pacific Coast League baseball, including the Coast League Cyclopedia and the Early PCL Statistical Record, 1903-1957. His non-baseball related books have been reviewed in the Sunday New York Times, Chicago Tribune and Los Angeles Times, among others.

DAN BOYLE grew up in the Bronx and hates the Yankees. He moved to San Diego in 1995, just in time for the Padres' unexpected Western Division title in 1996 and NL Championship in 1998. Since then, rooting for the Padres and the Mets has been mostly an exercise in character building. Researching the 1936 Padres season has been a welcome respite. He highly recommends poring over microfilm of old newspapers because you'll never know what you'll find.