Current
Season
Team
History
All-Time Leaders Batting
Pitching
League Championship Titles: None
Ballpark: Gilmore Field
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Gilmore Field Opened:
1939 Capacity: 12,987
Beverly Boulevard and Genesee Avenue,
Hollywood, California |
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Factors
AVG overall 1.010
LHB 1.010, RHB 1.010
Doubles 1.032
Triples 1.182
HR overall 1.239
LHB 1.239, RHB 1.239
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Distances/wall heights
Left Field line 335 ft./10 ft.
Left Field 350 ft./10 ft.
Left-Center Field 385 ft./10 ft.
Center Field 400 ft./10 ft.
Right-Center Field 385 ft./10 ft.
Right Field 350 ft./10 ft.
Right Field line 335 ft./10 ft. |
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In the Redux
The Stars have yet to win a Pacific Coast League
championship. They made postseason appearances (as
the Mission Bells) in 1926 and 1935. The club
represented Los Angeles as the Vernon Tigers until
1925, and San Francisco as the Bells from 1926
through 1937.
Real-life history
In 1909 the PCL expanded from four teams to six,
and one of the new entries was the Vernon Tigers.
Vernon boasted a population of 772 according to
the 1910 U.S. Census but was just five miles south
of downtown Los Angeles; more importantly, it was
one of only two “wet” cities in Los Angeles County
in 1909 and Tigers owner Edward Meier took full
advantage of the opportunity, building Maier Park
adjacent to the self-proclaimed “longest bar in
the world”, Doyle’s Bar. The crowds weren’t quite
up to Maier’s expectations, so he moved the club
across town to Venice for the 1913 and 1914
seasons. Attendance was even worse there, so by
1915 the Tigers were back in Vernon.
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The 1952 PCL Champion Hollywood Stars |
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For two years the team that would one day be
known as the Hollywood Stars was, ironically,
co-owned by one of the first actual
Hollywood stars, silent film giant Roscoe “Fatty”
Arbuckle. Arbuckle purchased a controlling
interest in the Tigers in 1919 and was rewarded
with the team’s first pennant, followed by an
encore crown in 1920. Despite the success,
Arbuckle bowed out after the ’20 campaign and
attendance flagged. The team moved to San
Francisco in 1926.
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There was no love lost between the Stars
and the Angels in the ‘40s and ‘50s. Fans
who came out to watch a contest between
the crosstown rivals at Gilmore Field
sometimes got to see a hockey game break
out. |
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Initially they called themselves the Mission
Bells, and then, beginning in 1928, the Mission
Reds. Often they were referred to by fans and the
press as “the Missions” or the “San Francisco
Missions”, although these were never official
titles. The team was intended to represent the
Mission district in San Francisco, and they in
fact played their games in that district, first in
Recreation Park, and then at Seals Stadium. They
shared both parks with the Seals but could not
compete with the older, more established club in
attendance. The Bells/Reds never won a pennant in
San Francisco, although they did manage one
first-place finish, in 1929. After the 1937 season
they headed south again, reviving the Hollywood
Stars name.
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Better yet, Gilmore being a haven for the
Tinseltown elite, there was always the
chance that Marilyn Monroe might show up
to work on her Eephus pitch. |
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By 1939 the Stars had their own Hollywood
ballpark, Gilmore Field, and were ready to live up
to their name. Co-owned by several prominent
show-biz figures, they promoted themselves as “The
Hollywood Stars baseball team, owned by the
Hollywood Stars”. Tinseltown luminaries were on
hand for many of the games. The team wore short
pants some seasons. Sportwriters nicknamed them
the “Twinks”. They were the first team to
regularly broadcast home games on television. As
affiliates of the Dodgers and Pirates, they were
perennial contenders and took the pennant in 1949,
1952, and 1953. They developed a fierce rivalry
with their crosstown rivals, the Angels, and at
times eclipsed them in popularity.
But they weren’t going to be able to compete with
the MLB Dodgers, who moved to Los Angeles in 1958.
The “stars” sold the Stars to a Salt Lake City
group, returning that city to the PCL for the
first time since 1925. They moved again, to
Tacoma, in 1966 and remain there to this day. The
current edition of the club retains elements of
the “classic” PCL in their choice of name, logo
and uniforms: as the Tacoma Rainiers, an affiliate
of the Seattle Mariners, they have adopted the
branding of that city’s former PCL mainstay.
Vernon Tigers/Mission Bells/Hollywood
Stars Uniform History
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1921-1923 Home
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1924-1925 Home
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1926-1929 Home
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1930-1931 Home
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1932 Home
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1921-1923 Away
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1924-1925 Away
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1926-1929 Away
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1930-1931 Away
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1932 Away
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1933-1934 Home
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1935 Home
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1936-1937 Home
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1938 Home
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1939 Home
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1933-1934 Away
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1935 Away
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1936-1937 Away
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1938 Away
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1939 Away
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1940-1941 Home
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1942-1944 Home
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1945-1949 Home
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1950-1957 Home
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1940-1941 Away
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1942-1944 Away
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1945-1949 Away
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1950-1957 Away
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