April 24-AL’s FIRST OFFICIAL GAME

APRIL 24, 1901 | CHICAGO, ILLINOIS  –  The Chicago White Sox won the first official “major league” game of the American League on this date in 1901. The White Sox defeated the Cleveland Blues (today’s Cleveland Indians) 8-2.

The driving force behind the American League was Ban Johnson. He took the existing Western League – a minor league – changed its named to the American League. They played a minor league schedule for one more year, 1900. Then began playing as a major league in 1901. The rest is history.

Contributing sources:
SABR’s Retro sheet

Published by

Bill Grimes

I'm from Chicago. I worked in broadcast journalism for much of the 1970's and 80's. In 1990 I became a litigation consultant, retiring in 2017. Around 2005 I recall flipping through the sports section of the newspaper coming across "On this day in baseball history Willie Mays hit his 600th home run." I enjoyed the one-liners, but I wanted more. I wanted a story. I took my news reporting skills and started researching and telling baseball stories, one for every day of the year. TodayinBaseball.com is the result.