Napoleon "Larry" Lajoie
Bound for Cooperstown
Napoleon “Larry” Lajoie was born on September 5, 1875, in Woonsocket. As a young man he worked in a cotton mill and drove a wagon for City Lumber Company for $1.50 a day. His baseball career started in Woonsocket when he played for the Globe Stars in the early 1890’s. He played his first professional games for the Fall River minor league team in 1896. During that year he won the New England batting title with an average of .429 at the age of twenty.
After that outstanding season, he was acquired by the Philadelphia Phillies and played with that club until he jumped to the new American League Philadelphia Athletics in 1901. It was during that season that he also set the still standing American League single season batting record with an average of .422.
In 1902, Lajoie was traded to the Cleveland Broncos where he played 14 seasons. His popularity led the team to change its name from the Broncos to the Napoleons (“Naps” for short). When he left, the team changed the name to the Cleveland Indians.
During his impressive career he accumulated a .339 lifetime batting average, hitting .350 or better during ten seasons. As a fielder he was equally outstanding, and no second baseman was his equal. In 1908 he set an American League record for the most chances accepted by a second baseman in one season – 988.
In 1937 when he was inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame, his plaque singled him out as a “great hitter and most graceful and effective second baseman of his era”. Napoleon Lajoie died on February 7, 1959, in Daytona Beach Florida.
