Background
Charles Walter Dressen was born on September 20, 1898, in Decatur, Illinois, the son of Philip Dressen, a tavern manager, and Katherine Driscoll.
Charles Walter Dressen was born on September 20, 1898, in Decatur, Illinois, the son of Philip Dressen, a tavern manager, and Katherine Driscoll.
Dressen was attending Assumption High School in Decatur.
A natural athlete, Dressen was only fourteen when he began pitching semiprofessional baseball at $7. 50 a game. While attending Assumption High School in Decatur he played baseball and football, becoming the star quarterback.
In 1919 Dressen began his professional career in both baseball and football. In the summer he played second base with Moline, Illinois, in the 3-I League, batting . 306 in forty-two games. That fall he was a quarterback for the Decatur Staleys (which later became the Chicago Bears).
In 1920 Dressen played baseball with Peoria in the 3-I League, appearing in 138 games and batting . 283. The next year he again played in 138 games with Peoria, raising his batting average to . 301. Dressen continued his dual sports life, but baseball began to establish its preeminence. As a third baseman with St. Paul in the American Association, Dressen batted . 304 in both 1922 and 1923. The following year he enjoyed his best season in professional baseball. In 164 games he batted . 346, with 212 hits, 110 runs scored, 18 home runs, and 151 runs batted-in.
In 1925 the twenty-six-year-old Dressen was signed to a major-league contract by the Cincinnati Reds. He remained with the Reds for six years, enjoying his most successful seasons in 1927 and 1928, when he batted . 292 and . 291 respectively. In 1931 Dressen returned to the minor leagues, drifting to Minneapolis in the American Association and then to Baltimore in the International League. Dressen's final baseball-playing experience came with the New York Giants in the last sixteen games of the 1933 season. In his mediocre eight-season major-league playing career Dressen appeared in 646 games and batted . 272, with 123 doubles, 29 triples, and 11 home runs. He scored 313 runs and batted-in 221.
Meanwhile, in the middle of the 1932 season, he began his managerial career with the Nashville Volunteers of the Southern League. He got the job by promising that he would forfeit his pay for the season if the club did not win half their remaining contests. He won the gamble by a single game. Dressen's brashness also paid off in the 1933 World Series when, in the eleventh inning, the Giants were leading 2 to 1 and the Washington Senators had the bases loaded.
As Giant manager Bill Terry stood on the pitcher's mound, Dressen sprinted from the dugout, uninvited, to advise Terry to play the infield back for a double play. When a double play then ended the game, Dressen gained a reputation as a shrewd strategist. In 1934 Dressen directed the Volunteers to a league championship for the first half of the split-season format. That July Larry MacPhail, the general manager of the Cincinnati Reds, gave Dressen his first major-league managerial position.
Under Dressen the Reds won a total of 218 games while losing 284, never achieving a winning season or finishing higher than fifth in the league standings. Dressen left the club before the 1937 season was over. The next year he was back in Nashville, where he led the Volunteers to a second-place finish. In 1939 MacPhail, then general manager of the Brooklyn Dodgers, hired Dressen as a coachunder field manager Leo Durocher. Dressen's duties involved handling pitchers, conducting pregame warm-ups, and coaching third base. After finishing third in 1939, the Dodgers climbed to second place in 1940 and won the National League pennant in 1941, losing to the New York Yankees four games to one in the World Series.
At the end of the 1942 season baseball commissioner Kenesaw Mountain Landis urged Branch Rickey, who had become president of the Dodgers following MacPhail's departure for the army, to rid the ballclub of anyone associated with gambling. In November 1942 Dressen, hardly more than a $2 bettor at the racetrack, was fired despite Durocher's protests. Eight months later, in July 1943, Dressen was quietly rehired, and he remained on the Dodger coaching staff through the 1946 season.
In 1946-1947 Dressen managed a team of major leaguers who played exhibition games in the United States and Cuba. In October Rickey asked Dressen to contact Roy Campanella after a game in Newark, New Jersey, between the Negro League All Stars and Dressen's barnstorming team. Jackie Robinson had been signed by the Dodgers the year before, and now Dressen set up an appointment for Campanella to meet Rickey in Brooklyn. Campanella and pitcher Don Newcombe became the next black stars to excel for the Dodgers.
In 1947 Dressen began a two-year stint as a pitching coach with the New York Yankees, but not without controversy. Rickey claimed that Dressen had promised to stay with the Dodgers unless he secured a managerial post. Commissioner A. B. "Happy" Chandler settled the dispute by suspending Dressen for thirty days at the beginning of the season. That year the Yankees won the American League pennant and World Series, defeating the Dodgers four games to three. However, the next season the Yankees fell to third place, and when Casey Stengel was hired to manage the team, Dressen replaced him as manager of the Oakland Acorns of the Pacific Coast League. The Acorns won the league championship in 1950 after finishing second in 1949. Dressen's success with the Acorns led to his return to the Dodgers - this time as manager. He remained from 1951 to 1953, winning a total of 298 games and losing only 166. During his three-year tenure he guided the Dodgers to two league championships and presided over an agonizing near miss for a third title.
On August 11, 1951, the Dodgers held a thirteen-and-a-half-game lead over the New York Giants. But during the season's climactic weeks the team's fortunes reversed. The Dodgers struggled while the Giants won thirty-seven of their last forty-four games, forcing a playoff series. In what was perhaps the most memorable game in baseball history, Bobby Thomson hit a home run off Dodger relief pitcher Ralph Branca to capture the National League pennant for the Giants. The Dodgers won the National League championship in 1952, but lost the World Series to the Yankees, four games to three.
In 1953 the Dodgers got off to a phenomenal start, with ten successive wins. They sustained their performance throughout the season, capturing the pennant on September 13, the earliest date up to that point. In the process they broke thirty-five National League records and won 105 games, hitting . 285 for the season with 208 home runs. Nevertheless, the Yankees won the 1953 World Series, four games to two, their record-breaking fifth world championship in a row. Dressen's sojourn with the Dodgers marked the pinnacle of his baseball career.
However, following a disagreement over his request for a two-year contract, Dressen left the Dodgers in 1954 to return to the Acorns as manager and general manager. He led the Acorns into the league playoff championship series, but left in 1955 to manage the Washington Senators. After two unsuccessful years, he was fired early in the 1957 season. He spent the remainder of the year in the Senators' front office as assistant to the president in charge of scouting.
In 1958 he returned to the Dodgers, now located in Los Angeles, as a coach under manager Walter Alston. Three weeks after the Dodgers won the 1959 World Series, Dressen signed a two-year contract to manage the Milwaukee Braves. He continued with the Braves until late in the 1961 season. After piloting Toronto in the International League to a 91-62 finish in 1962, Dressen rejoined the Dodgers as a special assistant to the general manager, handling scouting chores. On June 18, 1963, he was named manager of the ninth-place Detroit Tigers. He remained with this club until his death, winning a total of 245 games and losing 207, and placing fourth in the ten-team league in 1964 and 1965.
Dressen's self-confidence, almost total recall of baseball facts, and willingness to talk baseball at any hour made him popular with the media in New York City. He threw and batted right-handed and was listed at 5 feet 5 inches (1. 65 m) tall and 145 pounds (66 kg) during his days as an active player.
On January 8, 1942, Dressen married Ruth Sinclair; they had no children.
