#103 Dick Farrell

Dick Farrell  Philadelphia Phillies

Career: Turk Farrell was a four-time NL All-Star who pitched for 13 seasons, mostly in Philadelphia and Houston. He spent part of the 1961 season with the Dodgers. Of his nearly 600 appearances 134 were starts, mostly coming with the Colt 45s/Astros. He had a reputaion as a 'hard living' guy. He moved to England after he retired to work on an offshore rig. At 43 he was killed when his motorcycle was hit by a drunk driver.

In 1960: He won 10 games and had 11 saves for the Phils and racked up a very fine 2.70 ERA.

Off The Charts: In 1962 Farrell became one of eight pitchers selected to the All-Star squad while going on to 20 losses in the same season

The Card: Red seats, pinstripes...it's Connie Mack Stadium. That appears to be #28 behind Farrell which would be Curt Simmons.  I wondered why a vet wouldn't get a 'Season's Highlights' list but checking his stats shows that 1959 was an off-year for him after pitching pretty well in 1957-58. He did get what appears to be a Jack Davis cartoon though.

#90 Bobby Avila

Bobby Avila  Milwaukee Braves

Career: He played 11 seasons with the Indians and in their pennant-winning year of 1954 he won the AL batting title and finished third in the MVP voting. He struggled at the plate in the series against the Giants with just two hits in 15 at bats. He was a three-time All-Star. He played his final big league season with three clubs, the Orioles, Red Soxm and Braves. He finished with a .281 average for his career.

In 1960: Avila was farmed out in the spring of 1960 and wound up playing one final season, with the Mexico City Tigers. He helped that club with the pennant with a .333 average and he set a record for runs scored. After the season he began the next phase of his life by abecoming the president of Mexico's Vera Cruz League. 

Off The Charts: He's a member of Mexico's baseball Hall of Fame, has had two stadiums named for him, and served in Mexico's Congress and as the mayor of Vera Cruz.

The Card: This is a terrific card. Beautiful Braves classic uni with Connie Mack Stadium as the backdrop.

#52 Dave Philley

Dave Philley  Philadelphia Phillies

Career: Eight teams, 18 seasons over the course of 21 years, a three year WWII military stint. Dave Philley had a lot of stories to tell at Old Timers games I'd bet. He began in 1941 with the White Sox, took some time for serving his country and then played almost 1900 more games before he retired in 1963 at the age of 43. That year, after a long big league career, he got in a few swings with the Colt 45s' minor league team in Modesto while serving primarily as a coach/instructor.

His SABR bio is good reading.

In 1960: He was dealt twice during the season, first from the Phils to the Giants, then from the Giants to the Orioles. He had a career-low .218 average as he neared the end of the playing trail.

Off The Charts: He earned Orioles' MVP honors in 1955 by hitting .299 in a role as a platoon outfielder and primary pinch hitter.

The Card: Connie Mack Stadium photo cards are easy to spot with those red seats. Of course, the Phils' red pinstripes is a giveaway as well. The first bullet highlight relates to the cartoon as Philley had a nice string of pinch-hit appearances dating back to the 1958 season.

#305 Richie Ashburn

Richie Ashburn  Chicago Cubs

Career: Richie Ashburn was a five time All Star outfielder who won batting titles with the Phils in 1955 and 1958. In his 15 year career he led the NL in OBP four times, hits three times, walks four times, triples twice and putouts by an outfielder nine times. He was elected to the Hall of Fame by the Veteran's Committee in 1995. He had 29 career homers, seven of those coming with the '62 expansion Mets in his final season.

12 of his seasons were with the Phils and he returned to Philadelphia as a broadcaster after his retirement as an active player.

In 1960: This was Ashburn's first season in Chicago after 12 with the Phils. He was acquired in a trade for John Buzhardt, Al Dark and Jim Woods. He led the NL in OBP and walks. His .291 average was a bounce-back after having dipped into the .230s in 1959.

WikiFacts: From Wikipedia...

After his playing career, Ashburn was hired by the Philadelphia Phillies as an analyst in 1963. Originally, Ashburn worked with Bill Campbell and Ford Frick Award winner Byrum Saam. When Campbell left the Phillies in 1970, he was replaced by Harry Kalas. Kalas and Ashburn would work together on Phillies broadcasts for twenty-seven years.

Ashburn, who was a boyhood friend of comedian Johnny Carson, became known for his homespun stories of his boyhood in Nebraska. He would lament the mistakes of the Phillies with an "Oh brother." Photographs of an aging Ashburn showed him with a jeff cap and a pipe. His rapport with Kalas was both legendary and genuine, Kalas referred to him as "His Whiteness."

The Card: Connie Mack Stadium is the backdrop for the picture in this one. Ashburn wears Phils gear without a cap. Topps painted the Cubs' "C" onto his cap in the secondary picture. card has a nice color combo but loses points for a capless player. Poor Richie.

#167 Valmy Thomas

Valmy Thomas  Philadelphia Phillies

Career: Culled from my post on his '59 card: Thomas played in Canada and across the Caribbean between the late 40's and 1951 when he played for the Pirates minor league club north of the border. A pay cut prompted him to 'retire' and he starred in the Dominican Republic for several seasons. SABR has a cool story of his years there online.

He emerged as a Giants farmhand in 1956 after a year back in Canada for the Pirate chain. He debuted in 1957 for the Giants in New York. He travel to the West Coast when the Giants moved and played for the Phillies, Orioles and Indians in the three subsequent years. By doing do he became one of two players to play in five cities in five seasons. Dave Rader being the other*.

In 1960: Valmy played for the Orioles in 1960 after being purchased from the Phils' organization in May. He got into seven games before being sent to the minors and was back up for a September look. In all he had a hit in 16 at bats.

WikiFacts: Again, from my post on his 1959 card:

After his playing days he was a successful businessman and public servant in his native Virgin Islands. He passed away in 2010 and was honored by the Congressional Delegate from his homeland. Here is another article which highlights his life and career.

One odd note.... Thomas was shot and nearly killed by another ballplayer in a dispute over a woman in 1962. The link goes to a Sarasota Herald story that's a real eye opener, in several ways.

The Card: I wish I had been able to see a game at Connie Mack Stadium. It looks so colorful. I never talk much about 'poses' but Thomas is in that fake 'swing follow through' pose that you see on a bunch of vintage cards. Who looks like that at the plate? It just looks awkward. But besides all that it's worth noting that he got a cool cartoon while not having enough good things happening in 1959 to merit a 'season's highlights' back.

If you count the abundance of red on this card Valmy has a six color scheme going...blue, green, yellow, white, black and red.

 *=Tip of the cap to reader Paul for pointing that out to me on the '59 blog.

#91 Bennie Daniels

Bennie Daniels  Pittsburgh Pirates

Career: After a couple of underwhelming years in the Pirates' chain ('51/'52)  Daniels did a stint in the military and then returned to pitch in the minors for the better part of four seasons with much more success. He debuted in late 1957 (see below) and won a spot on the Pirates' staff in 1959. After two underwhelming years he was dealt to the Senators in a trade that brought Bobby Shantz to the Buccos. Daniels had a fine first year in Washington but never could repeat it. He retired after the 1966 season which he spent in the minors. 

In 1960: He divided the season between the Pirates and their AAA Columbus club. He had started the season in the Pirates' rotation but by June he had lost that spot, was unable to right himself in the bullpen and was farmed out. he ended up 1-3 with some pretty brutal numbers.

WikiFacts: From the Institute of Sports, Media and Society's blog comes this Bennie Daniels backstory:

Ebbets Field is the nirvana, the heaven, the Elysian Fields of corporate memory for all those baseball fanatics too young to have attended a game there.  But, let me tell you a crazy story about the last game played on Ebbets’s yellowing diamond.  The game was played in a descending and gloomy darkness, September 24, 1957.
The opposing pitcher in that game was a man named Bennie Daniels.  It was his first Major League appearance.  Bennie was called up at the end of the season by the Pittsburgh Pirates and given his first Major League start, an auspicious occasion for any young pitcher.  I have seen authors of baseball trivia books ask to shake Bennie’s hand because of the honor of shaking the hand of the last opposing pitcher in Ebbets Field.
Bennie Daniels recently recorded five hours of his personal history for the USC Annenberg African-American Experience in Major League Baseball digital library.  You can find information about the library here.
Now, you would think Bennie would be a fount of information about the last night of Ebbets Field baseball.  You would think he would have glowing autumnal memories of Ebbets in its final splendor.
But, life doesn’t’ work that way.
Asked about the last game in Ebbets Field, Bennie will tell you he doesn’t remember much of it.  Asked about pitching in Ebbets, Bennie will say it was terrible.  The place was a bandbox.  Pitchers hated pitching there.  Asked about the thing he remembered most about pitching in Ebbets’s last game, he will say the only thing that really mattered to him is that he pitched seven good innings and showed the Pirates he could pitch in the Major Leagues.
Bennie Daniels would pitch in the Major Leagues well into the 1960s.  He would be the first African-American pitcher to start a game before the President of the United States on opening day (President Kennedy).  He would pitch on the great Pittsburgh Pirates team of 1960, the one that would go on to defeat the heavily favored Maris-Mantle Yankees in a classic seven game World Series.  He would pitch on the expansion Washington Senators of the 1960s.
You ask Bennie about any of those experiences and he will discuss them in the same business-like way he does the last game at Ebbets Field.
If you want Bennie to light up, if you want him to lean forward and talk about something cool, ask him about the time he played a bit role on the 1960s tv series “I Spy.”  Bennie will smile and tell you the whole story in happy detail, right down to how painful it was to drop to his knees at a run as he was supposedly shot to death.
Bennie appeared in the only “I Spy” episode that the show’s star Robert Culp both wrote and directed.  So, he auditioned for Culp, his first time meeting the star.

The Card: Daniels looks to be in Connie Mack Stadium for this shot. Those red seats and the shape of the corner stands is familiar from many 1959 cards I looked at. Any card with a pink element is A-OK in my book.