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AMERICA'S NATIONAL GAME

pennant, declining, for some reason, to meet the Boston winners of the American League pennant. This fact only sharpened the desire of the public for another contest. The wish was gratified in 1905, when the New York Champions met and defeated the Philadelphia Athletics, of the American League, winning four out of five games played.

In 1906 the tables were turned, and the Chicago White Sox, of the American League, defeated the Chicago Cubs, of the National League, winning four games to two of the series. The public was now beginning to look upon the World's Championship as a sort of hippodrome, cut and dried, to go one year to one and the next year to the other League. However, Captain Chance, of the Chicago National Cubs, upset that theory by winning the world's series over the Detroit Tigers, of the American League, two seasons in succession, capturing pennants in both 1907 and 1908, and the Pittsburg National League Club winning from the Detroit American League Club in 1909, and the Athletic American League Club winning from the Chicago National League Club in 1910.

Of scarcely less interest than the World's Championship contests were those between leaders in both the National and American Leagues in 1908, Chicago, New York and Pittsburg teams crowding each other in the National race, and Detroit, Cleveland and Chicago alternating throughout the season for the first place in the American League.

In 1909 the race in the National League was between Pittsburg and Chicago, Pittsburg winning. In the Amer-