Sy Sanborn

Irving Ellis Sanborn
(Sy)

• School Dartmouth College

• Born November 28, 1866 in Albany, VT USA
• Died July 18, 1932 in Canandaigua, NY USA

Biographical Information

Sy Sanborn was one of the most well-known baseball journalists in the 1900s.

He began his career in Massachusetts and worked for the Springfield Union for 11 years, and wrote articles about Yale University and Harvard University's baseball teams, both of which played in the area. During the offseason, he wrote articles about theatre performances while in Springfield, MA. Sanborn was apparently a really good friend of Tom Burns, who is credited with teaching him how to become a better writer.

When the Chicago White Sox became a major league team in 1901, the Chicago Tribune hired Sanborn to cover their games. In 1908 he helped in organizing the Baseball Writers' Association of America (BWAA). He worked for the Tribune through 1920, following the aftermath of the Black Sox Scandal. He became the president of the BWAA in 1919. In 1922, he headed the committee of writers that voted on the attribution of the re-created American League MVP Award.

After retiring, he moved to Canandaigua, NY, in the Finger Lakes region. His health began to decline and he was sent to a sanitorium for 11 months. He began to recover for some time but his health began to fail again. He began to suffer mentally after his health became so bad that he was barely able to leave his house anymore and in 1932 he shot himself dead in his garden at the age of 67.