page_title: Christy Mathewson
section_title: Death and legacy
hierarchical_section_title: Christy Mathewson / Death and legacy
caption_attribution_description: English: The Christy Mathewson "Cure Cottage" in Saranac Lake, New York. Taken by User:Mwanner, 29 November, 2007.
context_page_description: Christopher Mathewson, nicknamed "Big Six", "The Christian Gentleman", "Matty", and "The Gentleman's Hurler", was a Major League Baseball right-handed pitcher, who played 17 seasons with the New York Giants. He stood 6 feet 1 inch tall and weighed 195 pounds. He was among the most dominant pitchers in baseball history, and ranks in the all-time top 10 in several key pitching categories, including wins, shutouts, and ERA. In 1936, Mathewson was elected into the Baseball Hall of Fame as one of its first five members.
  Mathewson grew up in Factoryville, Pennsylvania, and began playing semiprofessional baseball when he was 14 years old. He played in the minor leagues in 1899, recording a record of 21 wins and two losses. He pitched for the New York Giants the next season, but was sent back to the minors. He eventually returned to the Giants, and went on to win 373 games in his career, a National League record. He led the Giants to victory in the 1905 World Series by pitching three shutouts. Mathewson never pitched on Sundays, owing to his Christian beliefs.
context_section_description: After contracting tuberculosis, Mathewson moved to the frigid climate of Saranac Lake, New York in the Adirondack Mountains, where he sought treatment from Edward Livingston Trudeau at his renowned Adirondack Cottage Sanitarium. He died in Saranac Lake, New York, of tuberculosis on October 7, 1925. Mathewson is buried at Lewisburg Cemetery in Lewisburg, Pennsylvania, adjacent to Bucknell University. Members of the Pittsburgh Pirates and the Washington Senators wore black armbands during the 1925 World Series. Mathewson had died on the day the series began, October 7. According to Baseball, some of Mathewson's last words were to his wife: "Now Jane, I want you to go outside and have yourself a good cry. Don't make it a long one; this can't be helped."
  Christy Mathewson Day is celebrated as a holiday in his hometown of Factoryville, Pennsylvania, on the Saturday closest to his birthday.
  Christy Mathewson Day and Factoryville, Pennsylvania, are the subjects of the documentary, Christy Mathewson Day.
  Bucknell's football stadium is named "Christy Mathewson–Memorial Stadium".
  The baseball field at Keystone College is named "Christy Mathewson Field".
  Christy Mathewson Park in Factoryville is home to the community's Little League field, as well as basketball courts and other athletic facilities, public gardens, walking trails, and a picnic pavilion.
  The former Whittenton Ballfield in Taunton, Massachusetts, is named in memory of Christy Mathewson, who played for the Taunton team in the New England Baseball League before he joined the New York Giants.
  Mathewson is mentioned in the poem "Line-Up for Yesterday" by Ogden Nash.
  F. Scott Fitzgerald refers to "Christy Mathewson" in his first novel, This Side of Paradise (1920).
  Jazz pianist Dave Frishberg, composer of several baseball-themed songs, wrote one called "Matty" for Mathewson.
  Mathewson is a central character in Eric Rolfe Greenberg's historical novel The Celebrant, which chronicles turn-of-the-century American life by weaving together Mathewson's story with the life of an immigrant Jewish family in New York. In 2002, the book was selected as one of the top 100 sports books of all time by Sports Illustrated.
caption: Mathewson's private "cure cottage" in Saranac Lake
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