On Juy 23, 1910, the Detroit Tigers beat the New York Highlanders in a routine Saturday afternoon matchup at New York’s Hilltop Park. The 6-2 game had no effect on the American League pennant race, which was won easily by the Philadelphia A’s that year. It didn’t include a walkoff hit or a classic pitching performance.
It was just another routine regular season game that would have been long forgotten by now except for one thing: On the field that day, standing behind third base, was a photographer named Charles Conlon. And through sheer luck, the 40-something Conlon took what would prove to be one of baseball’s most famous photographs.
The iconic image shows Ty Cobb, the legendary Georgia Peach, kicking up a cloud of dirt as he slides hard into third base, manned by New York’s Jimmy Austin. In the distance, umpire Silk O’Loughlin signals safe.The 23-year-old Cobb clenches his teeth, his face a study in intensity.
It is “no doubt the most famous baseball photo ever taken,” Cobb biographer Al Stump wrote.
MORE: Classic Ty Cobb images | Historic Conlon baseball photos
(Photo by Charles M. Conlon/Sporting News. The cropped image at top is the best known version of the picture. The full version below was never published until 1993, when it was included in a book published by Sporting News.)
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The photograph is notable in part because action shots were difficult to capture with the photographic equipment of the day. Consider this: When Conlon took the picture, he was under the hood of a bulky, tripod-supported Graflex camera like the one seen here. After snapping a shot, he had to change plates. Not ideal for capturing a single moment in a baseball game.
And it almost didn’t happen.
Here’s how Conlon described the moment in Sporting News in 1937:
The strange thing about the picture is that I did not know I had snapped it. I was off third, chatting with Jimmy Austin … Cobb was on second with one out, and the hitter was trying to bunt him to third. Austin moved in for the sacrifice. As Jimmy stood there, Cobb started. The fans shouted. Jimmy turned, backed into the base, and was greeted by a strom of dirt, spikes, shoes uniforms — and Ty Cobb. My first thought was that my friend, Austin, had been injured. When Cobb stole, he stole . Spikes flew and he did not worry about where. I saw Cobb’s clenched teeth, his determined look. … But in a moment I realized he wasn’t hurt, and I was relieved because Jimmy and I were very close friends. Then I began to wonder if by any chance I had snapped the play. I couldn’t remember that I had, but I decided to play safe and change plates anyway. I went home kicking myself. I said, ‘Now there’s a great picture and you mised it.’ I took out my plates and developed them. There was Cobb stealing third. In my excitement, I had snapped it, by instinct.
From 1904 to 1942, Conlon took thousands of baseball photographs, capturing everyone from legends to ordinary players. Many of his images are displayed in the Baseball Hall of Fame. But none of his photos is as famous as the one he snapped “by instinct” 105 years ago today.
