George M. Steinbrenner III

In January 1920, the Yankees -- then Gotham's also-ran baseball franchise after the fabled Giants of Coopers Bluff -- acquired the Red Sox's left-handed pitcher and star slugger Babe Ruth for $125,000 in cash and a loan to Red Sox owner Harry Frazee, a theatrical entrepreneur, who needed the loot to finance a Broadway show. During the previous season, the Bambino (a 24-game winner and E. R. A.

Behind their new New York strongboy, the Yankees won the 1921, '22 and 23 AL pennants, facing the Giants in three consecutive World Series, losing the first two contests before finally beating them for the World's Championship in 1923).

The date of his death (July 13, 2010) was also the date of that year's Major League Baseball All-Star Game. The National League won the game 3-1, the first win for the Senior Circuit since 1996. During the first ten years of his ownership of the Yankees (1973-1982), the American League had gone winless in the All-Star Game. (From 1959 to 1987, the National League dominated the game with a 27-5-1 record. Before 1959, there was parity between the two leagues in the game.) From 1983 to 2009, the American League had a 20-3-1 winning record in the game.

champ as a starting pitcher, the Babe had set the World Series record by pitching 29 2/3 consecutive scoreless innings in the 1916 matchup with the Brooklyn Dodgers, which was finally broken by Whitey Ford in 1961, the same year Roger Maris broke his home run record) had set the modern home run record with 29 dingers for the Boston nine.

George Michael Steinbrenner III, one of the most successful sports franchise owners of the modern era, was born in Rocky River, Ohio on the Fourth of July, 1930, which is fitting for the owner of the New York Yankees, the premier baseball club in what is dubbed "America's Pasttime". (To fans of the Yankees' archrival, the Boston Red Sox, he is considered the Head of the "Evil Empire").

After graduating from Culver Military Academy in Culver, Indiana (the alma mater of cult director Budd Boetticher), Steinbrenner attended the exclusive Williams College located in western Massachusetts (the alma mater of Elia Kazan, Class of 1930).

Steinbrenner's interest in sports led to stints as an assistant football coach at Northwestern University in 1955 and at Purdue University the following year. While making his fortune in the shipping industry (he had joined his father's financially ailing American Shipbuilding Co.

, where he helped affect a turn-around), Steinbrenner bought the Cleveland Pipers of the National Industrial Basketball League in 1960. The team joined the American Basketball League the next year, and Steinbrenner made sports history by hiring John McLendon, the first African-American head coach in professional sports.

During the 1960s, Steinbrenner was a Broadway "angel" (investing in plays) and later acquired a small ownership stake in the NBA's Chicago Bulls.

The Yankes in the mid-1960s could not replace their aging stars with quality players, and in 1966, the team finished in 10th place (last) in the AL for the first time since 1912 (when there were only 8 teams), and ninth in 1967.

The team won the 1962 ABL championship, and Steinbrenner then pulled off a major coup by signing Ohio State All-American Jerry Lucas, the #1 basketball prospect in the country, thus keeping him from going to the better established National Basketball Association.

2 million after the 1964 season, from Dan Topping and Del Webb. In the 20 years they had owned the team, Topping and Webb's Yankees had missed appearing in the World Series only five times, racking up a 10-5 record.

In contrast, the CBS-owned teams never made it to the World Series, and in 1965, the Yankees finished in the second division for the first time in 40 years.

The year 1965 was crucial, as the major league amateur draft was implemented, which meant that the Yankees could no longer use its financial resources to sign any player they wanted. Also, the Kansas City AL franchise that the Yankees had used as a kind of farm club, cherry-picking its best players like Maris in return for worn-out veterans, had been acquired by maverick owner Charles O. Finley, who ended the special relationship.

By the beginning of the 1970s, the Yankees had won 29 pennants and 20 World Series, but hadn't been in the October Classic since 1964.

However, by 1971, Steinbrenner was wealthy enough to make a $9 million bid (approximately $43 million in 2005 dollars, when factored for inflation) to acquire the Cleveland Indians franchise in professional baseball's American League. However, the deal -- which was being negotiated by Indians General Manager Gabe Paul -- fell apart.

When Columbia Broadcasting System Chairman William Paley decided to rid the television broadcast network of its New York Yankees subsidiary in 1972, Paul helped broker the $8. 7 million deal by which Steinbrenner acquired the team. Steinbrenner then appointed him director of baseball operations for the club.

After taking over the Yankees on January 3, 1973, Steinbrenner -- who knew little about baseball but had coveted a baseball franchise, and now owned the most famous team in North American sports (which is now worth at least 100 times what Steinbreener paid for it) -- pledged that he would not be a hands-on owner. He soon won himself the sobriquet "The Boss" for his autocratic management style, characterized by his criticizing players and managers through the media and the 20 managers he had in his first 23 years owning the club. (In fact, Steinbrenner made 17 managerial changes in his first 17 seasons!). Controversy has been part of Steinbrenner's tenure as principal owner of the ball club and stadium that Babe Ruth and other Yankee greats made famous.

On 27 November 1974, Commissioner Bowie Kuhn suspended him for two years following his conviction for making illegal political campaign contributions to Richard Nixon. He was pardoned by President Ronald Reagan on 19 January 1989.

Repeatedly hired and fired manager Billy Martin five times from 1975 to 1989. The longest period Martin worked for Steinbrenner was from 1975 to 1978 (during which time the Yankees won the AL Champion pennant in 1976 and 1977 and won the World Series in 1977). This cycle ended with Martin's death on Christmas 1989. He had been hired for the up-coming 1990 season.

Was impersonated by Seinfeld (1989) co-creator Larry David starting in the show's fifth season finale.

Seeking synergy that would become common in the 1990s, the TV network CBS had bought the franchise for $11.

The longest tenured manager ever to work for Steinbrenner was Joe Torre from 1996-2007. In that time, the Yankees were AL Champs in 1996, 1998, 1999, 2000, and 2003. They won the World Series in 1996, 1998, 1999, and 2000.

His New York Yankees were beaten in the 2003 World Series four games to two despite costing $183 million to assemble.

In 2006, he donated $1 million to the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill for Boshamer Stadium for baseball.

In fact, to get Lucas into their league, the NBA immediately made a deal with Steinbrenner to absorb the Pipers as its 10th team, but as he was unable to raise the $250,000 franchise fee and was facing a lawsuit from the ABL, the deal collapsed. The Pipers soon went bankrupt, and Steinbrenner went back to the shipping industry, eventually buying the American Shipbuilding Co. outright.