Which Yankees manager died of erysipelas during the 1929 season?

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Which Yankees manager died of erysipelas during the 1929 season? The manager was Miller Huggins.

Huggins had managed the New York Yankees since 1918 and guided the club through one of the most successful periods in franchise history. Under his leadership, the Yankees won American League pennants and World Series titles while Babe Ruth became the sport’s dominant slugger.

Huggins fell seriously ill in September 1929 and entered St. Vincent’s Catholic Medical Center. Doctors diagnosed erysipelas, a serious bacterial skin infection. The infection was complicated by blood poisoning, or pyaemia, and Huggins died on September 25, 1929, at age 51.

The death stunned the Yankees and the wider baseball world. The American League canceled games for the day of his funeral, and thousands attended his viewing at Yankee Stadium. The wording can cause confusion because sources variously describe erysipelas as the initial illness and pyaemia as the fatal complication; both references point to Huggins.

Source: Wikipedia · fact-checked Sept. 2026

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