For many people, particularly non-baseball fans, Lou Gehrig is best known in association with the disease that took his life. Soon after he was diagnosed with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS) in 1939, the condition came to be widely known as Lou Gehrig’s disease. Even now, more than 80 years after Gehrig’s heyday as one of the best players in baseball history, this remains one of the most common ways to refer to the disease.

A Legendary Baseball Player

Before ALS took away his ability to play the game, Gehrig had a long career as one of the top players in Major League Baseball. He is remembered as one of the best first basemen in the history of the sport and an all-time New York Yankees great. Gehrig joined the team in 1923 and played until ALS forced him to retire in 1939. Over his sixteen-year career, he won six World Series titles with the Yankees, as well as many other accomplishments, including:

  • Seven All-Star Game appearances.
  • Two AL MVP titles.
  • One Triple Crown title. (Leading the league in home runs, runs batted in, and batting average.)
  • A special election to the Baseball Hall of Fame in the year of his retirement, 1939. (Players normally become eligible for induction five years after their retirement.)

However, one of Gehrig’s most impressive baseball feats may have been his streak, from 1925 to 1939, of playing 2,130 consecutive games—never missing a game for illness, injury, or rest. This achievement earned him the nickname “the Iron Horse” for his unprecedented stamina and durability. This record went unbroken for more than fifty-six years, until Cal Ripken Jr. surpassed Gehrig’s total in 1995.

The Luckiest Man on Earth

Gehrig’s legendary resilience made it even more shocking to the baseball world when, in 1938, he began to struggle physically. Seemingly out of nowhere, he began to lose power in his swing and had trouble running the bases. After putting up the worst numbers of his career over the first few weeks of the 1939 season, his consecutive game streak ended when he asked the Yankees’ manager, Joe McCarthy, to bench him.

That summer, after weeks of tests, he received a diagnosis of ALS at the Mayo Clinic. ALS is a progressive neurodegenerative disease that attacks motor neurons in the brain and spinal cord. This results in the wasting away of muscle, loss of movement, and eventual paralysis. The disease is 100% fatal, with most people living 3-5 years after diagnosis. An estimated 30,000 people are living with ALS in the United States at any given time.

At 36 years old, having been an all-star player just the year before, Gehrig’s baseball career was over. He announced his retirement soon after, and, on July 4th, 1939, he came to Yankee Stadium to address the fans one last time. In a speech now considered one of the most important moments in sports history, he declared to the crowd that, despite everything, he still considered himself “the luckiest man on the face of the earth” for having had the opportunity to play the game he loved.

Two years later, on June 2nd, 1941, Lou Gehrig passed away at the age of 38.

Honoring Lou Gehrig’s Legacy

Lou Gehrig continues to be an important part of baseball history and is revered as a legend of the game. In 2021, a group of ALS activists worked with the MLB to create Lou Gehrig Day, an annual celebration of his legacy on June 2nd—the anniversary of both his first game as a Yankee and his passing.

Each year, teams across the league present tributes to Gehrig, as well as people living with ALS today. The event aims to raise funds and awareness for ALS-related organizations, including research, a desperately important cause given that, for most people with the disease, the prognosis remains the same as it was when Gehrig was diagnosed more than 80 years ago.

To learn more about Lou Gehrig Day and how it supports ALS research at institutions like the ALS Therapy Development Institute (ALS TDI), click here.

For more information about his life, career, and ALS diagnosis, check out this recent installment of ALS TDI’s Fight ALS Film Fest on The Pride of the Yankees, a 1942 biopic about Lou Gehrig. This discussion features Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Jonathan Eig, author of Luckiest Man: The Life and Death of Lou Gehrig.

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