William Ben Chapman was born December 25, 1908, in Nashville, Tennessee. He moved to Birmingham, Alabama, in 1915 and had a brilliant athletic career at Phillips High School. He turned down football scholarships at Alabama and Purdue. His professional baseball career spanned the years from 1928 to '46 as a player and from 1945 to '53 as a manager. He played at New York, Washington, Boston, Cleveland, Brooklyn and Philadelphia where he also managed for four years. He led the American League in stolen bases for 4 years and had a major league batting average of .302. Ben played for six years on the New York Yankees team with Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig. He passed away in 1993.
