Sadly it doesn't look like anyone tried to light buses on fire back in 1958 when the Giants moved into town, but “Foghorn Murphy” was on the scene. Wait, who?
There's not a lot of details on this guy and what he did. This question was posted on a bulletin board in 2003:
Any information on the real “Foghorn” Murphy S.F “sporting” figure??
Hello, Does anyone have any information on “Foghorn” Murphy, who got his nickname by opening baseball games and rodeos using a loud instrument. Something of a quasi-underworld figure, he was quite a flamboyant and well known character in San Francisco during the 1920's. I'm also curious about his real name.
The only answer that turned up wasn't particularly great:
I met a “Foghorn” Murphy in L.A in Jan. 1950. He was running a diner that was along Riverside Drive. It was the old type dining car that was so common at that time. He said he got his name from selling newspapers on the streets of San Francisco in the fog. he was quite a character.
After digging around for a while, I found out he used to work as an announcer at the Livermore Rodeo, but there wasn't much on his baseball career. All I could find was this bit in April 1971 edition of Baseball Digest in the “Down Memory Lane” column by Warren Brown:
In my small boy existence, and even during my beginnings as a baseball writer for pay in San Francisco, there was a ballyhoo specialist known as “Foghorn” Murphy.
In baseball regalia, equipped with a megaphone, and astride a horse he would ride up and down Market Street each time there was a ball game scheduled, yelling about today's game.
Naturally “Foghorn” practiced knocked himself out on Opening Day.
After I moved first to New York and later to Chicago in the early '20's I lost track of “Foghorn.”
I caught up with him, or he with me, in Los Angeles when I was there with the Cubs on a training trip.
By that time, believe it or not, “Foghorn” had become wealthy enough to own a club of his own, had he cared to do so.
Like Emperor Norton, “Foghorn's” notoriety in San Francisco was so extensive that he was even a topic of a piece in the satire magazine The Wasp:
“Foghorn’s” Voice is Stilled
“Foghorn” Murphy’s famous voice is stilled.
The man who has made himself famous riding horseback has gone to work.
He is a fireman—a job that will not require the use of his lusty lungs or his deep bass voice.
Recently “Foghorn” applied for a place in the San Francisco department and after a short wait they made him a full-fledged fireman.
He is wearing the blue uniform now instead of the ball uniform that he wore in his famous horseback rides through the city. So for the present, at least, the voice of the celebrated “Foghorn” will cease to resound through busy downtown streets.
There you have it, San Francisco used to have a guy galloping up and down Market Street yelling at people who may or may not have opened a diner in LA. Should the Giants honor his memory Opening Day 2011 by putting some lunatic from the TL on a horse for the day? I have to vote yes.
(photos via What's on the 6th floor?)
