Stanislaw Franciszek Musial

"The Donora Greyhound"

b November 21, 1920 - Donora, PA
Son of Lukasz and Mary

I'm sure you already knew that Stanley Frank Musial is a great harmonica player currently residing in St. Louis, MO. I won't rattle-on about his musical ability as you have probably heard Stan play in one of the St. Louis Joints sometime within the last 60+ years.

However, I will point out that Stanley was a pretty fair baseball player in his day. Here are some of the non-musical facts relating to Stanley's consummate skill on the baseball diamond.

Stan The Man wore #6 for the St. Louis Cardinals for 22 years. Stan's number 6 was retired by the Cards in 1963. Stan was the first Cardinal to have his number retired.

7-time National League Batting Champion-1943, 1946, 1948, 1950, 1951, 1952, & 1957.

3-time baseball's Most Valuable Player-1943, 1946, & 1948.

Played in 24 All Star games.

Hit 5 home runs on May 2, 1954 against the New York Giants.

Played in 3,026 games and had 3,630 hits.
May 18, 2008 was "Stan Musial Day" at the ballpark and a pre-game ceremony was held to honor Stan on the 50th anniversary of his 3,000 hit. In addition, a portion of Eight Street was renamed "Stan Musial Drive". When you're at the stadium, check out "Stan Musial Plaza" located outside of Gate #3 where you'll find 3,630 bricks, one for each of his career hits. The bricks are evenly split as Stan had half of his hits at home and half on the road.

1,951 Runs Batted In and scored 1,949 runs.

Stan was the General Manager of The St. Louis Cardinals in 1967. Guess what team won the World Series that year?

.331 Career Batting Average with 475 Home Runs.

Elected to The Baseball Hall of Fame in 1969.

Inducted into the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame in 1995.

Served in the United States Navy in 1945.

Stan's baseball salary in 1938 was $65 per month!

Life-size Statue of Stan "The Man" Musial dedicated at Busch Stadium-St. Louis, MO in 1968. This statue was sculpted by Washington University fine arts professor Carl Mose. Five years in the making, Mr. Mose was picked to make the statue by the 1963 St. Louis Mayor Raymond Tucker.
Inscribed on the base of the statue are the words of former baseball commissioner Ford Frick, "Here stands baseball's perfect warrior, Here stands baseball's perfect knight."

An additional statue honoring Stan was unveiled on April 2, 2005 at the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame. The life-sized statue was made by Missouri sculptor Harry Weber and the statue is based on a 1963 sketch by Amadee Wohlschlaeger, an artist employed by The Post-Dispatch newspaper at the time. The sketch shows Musial signing an autograph for a youngster. Springfield, Missouri businessman John Q. Hammons provided the $100,000 to pay for the statue which will reside at the Hall of Fame in Springfield, Missouri.

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