Postcard Thursday: Dodging Trolleys

While some New Yorkers may have tuned out after the Yankees were eliminated from contention, there's a World Series going on between the Houston Astros and the Los Angeles (née Brooklyn) Dodgers. Tied at one game apiece, the series now moves to Houston.

The Dodgers were founded in Brooklyn in 1883 as the Brooklyn Grays, but by 1895 had acquired the nickname "Trolley Dodgers" after the increasing need for residents of Brooklyn to speed across streets to avoid oncoming trolleys. Not everyone was successful, and news reports of the era are filled with trolley accidents, such as the one in Newark (above) that killed ten children. 

For years the team went by many names, including the Brooklyn Bridgegrooms and Hanlon's Superbas and did not officially adopt the Dodgers moniker until 1933.

To get some sense of what trolley dodging was like, watch this film from the early 1900s taken from the front of a trolley making its way around Manhattan.

 

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