The sight of a hitter standing in the batter's box with bat in hand and batting helmet securely in place is common on baseball fields everywhere. It is hard to imagine that the game was once played without batting helmets. The development and evolution of the batting helmet came too late for some, but has saved the lives of many along the way.
Hard Lessons
In 1905, New York Giants catcher Roger Bresnahan created a batting helmet made of leather after being hit in the head and hospitalized during a game. The helmet idea was not popular among players, who thought it would lead to ridicule, so it didn't catch on. During a game in the 1920 season, Ray Chapman of the Cleveland Indians was hit in the head by New York Yankee pitcher Carl Mays and ended up dying of his injuries. Baseball's response was to ban the spitball, the kind of pitch that hit Chapman, but helmets were not brought into play.
Pee Wee and Joe
In the 1941 season, major league players and future hall of famers Pee Wee Reese and Joe Mednick tried batting helmets after they were both beaned in the previous season. Despite the endorsement of two higher-echelon players, helmets still did not catch on.
The Pirates
Pittsburgh Pirates General Manager Branch Rickey sought to have a batting helmet designed at the start of the 1950s. Charlie Muse helped develop the first real batting helmets, and the Pirates were the first team to wear them, in the 1952 and 1953 seasons. Players on other teams were slow to warm to the idea, but it got a push in 1954 when the Braves' Joe Adcock was beaned while wearing a helmet and escaped serious injury.
Mandatory Helmets
It wasn't until 1971 that batting helmets became mandatory in Major League Baseball. Helmets were made of hard plastic and finally offered protection to the heads of baseball players. In 1983, it became mandatory to have an ear flap on batting helmets to give even more protection and is the style popular today.
Another Hard Lesson
July 22, 2007, was another sad day for baseball because of a lack of a helmet, when Mike Coolbaugh, a minor league first base coach in the Colorado Rockies organization, was struck in the head by a ball and killed. On November 8 of that year, Major League Baseball made it mandatory for all base coaches to wear a protective helmet when on the field.
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