Saturday, November 14, 2026

Larry Walker is named NL MVP and the Coors Field bias finally loses

1997 · Denver

On November 14, 1997, the Baseball Writers Association of America announces that Colorado Rockies right fielder Larry Walker is the National League Most Valuable Player, the first Canadian to win the award in either league.

Walker had spent the summer hitting .366 with 49 home runs, 130 RBI, 33 stolen bases, and a .720 slugging percentage. He led the league in homers, on-base percentage, and slugging. He also hit .346 on the road with 29 of those home runs, which made the usual Coors Field asterisk harder to stick. The writers gave him 22 of 28 first-place votes and 359 points. Mike Piazza finished second. Jeff Bagwell was third.

Earlier Rockies had come close and been dismissed for playing in thin air. Dante Bichette finished second in 1995. Ellis Burks was third in 1996. Walker, asked later if he had expected the award, said he had not gotten too excited. He had seen what happened to the others. When the phone call came he went upstairs and, by his own account, did not hit any of the steps.

He was the first Canadian MVP. He would later go into the Hall of Fame. The Rockies still have not had another. November 14 is the day the newspapers printed the story, which is as close as Colorado history gets to a parade for a batting title.

Sources: Baseball-Reference: 1997 NL MVP voting · Los Angeles Times, Nov. 14, 1997 · Wikipedia: Larry Walker

Eugene O’Brien is born in Boulder and eventually decides medicine is less interesting than Mary Pickford

1880 · Boulder

Louis O’Brien, who will act under the name Eugene O’Brien, is born in Boulder on November 14, 1880. He becomes a silent-film leading man opposite Mary Pickford, Norma Talmadge, and Gloria Swanson before the talkies end the career.

His family wanted a doctor. He started medical studies at the University of Colorado, then switched to civil engineering under family pressure, then abandoned both for the stage. Charles Frohman signed him. He appeared on Broadway with Ethel Barrymore. By 1915 his first film was playing in Boulder’s Curran Theater so his family could finally see what he had been doing.

He spent the silent era as a matinee idol. When sound arrived he retired, making his last picture in 1928 at age 47. He died in Los Angeles in 1966. The funeral was in Hollywood. The body came back to Boulder and was buried in Green Mountain Cemetery next to his parents. The mountains got the last word, which is how most Colorado stories end if you wait long enough.

Sources: Wikipedia: Eugene O’Brien (actor)

Mamie Doud is born, and a house on Lafayette Street quietly becomes the Western White House

1896 · Denver

Mary Geneva Doud, who will marry Dwight Eisenhower and become First Lady, is born on November 14, 1896. The family moves to Denver; the wedding takes place in the music room of the house at 750 Lafayette Street, later known as the Summer White House.

Mamie was born in Boone, Iowa. Her father owned a meat-packing business and retired young enough to move the family west for the climate. They settled in Denver in 1905. The house on Lafayette Street was finished that year. In 1916, while the Douds were wintering in San Antonio, Mamie met a young West Point lieutenant named Dwight Eisenhower. They were married on July 1 in the first-floor music room of the Denver house.

For the next three decades the Eisenhowers moved from post to post. The Lafayette Street house remained the permanent address. After Ike was elected president the place acquired the unofficial title of Western White House. He recovered from a heart attack at Fitzsimons in 1955 while the family stayed with the Douds. There is still a park in Denver and a library in Broomfield named for Mamie. The house is still standing. The music room is still there. The mountains have not moved.

Sources: Wikipedia: Mamie Eisenhower · Colorado Encyclopedia: Doud House