On September 10, 1934, Roger Eugene Maris was born in Hibbing, Minnesota. Born Roger Eugene Maras, he moved with his family to North Dakota as a child and grew up largely in Fargo, where he became a standout multi-sport athlete before beginning his professional baseball career. His parents, Rudolph and Corrine Maras, were of Croatian heritage.
Maris achieved enduring baseball fame with the New York Yankees in 1961. That season, he and teammate Mickey Mantle pursued Babe Ruth’s revered single-season home-run record of 60. Under relentless media attention and the pressure surrounding the chase, Maris hit 61 home runs. His record-breaking 61st came on October 1, 1961, at Yankee Stadium, in the final game of the regular season. The mark remained Major League Baseball’s single-season home-run record for 37 years.
Maris was far more than a one-season phenomenon. He won consecutive American League Most Valuable Player Awards in 1960 and 1961, earned a Gold Glove in 1960, appeared in seven All-Star Games, and won three World Series championships: two with the Yankees in 1961 and 1962, and one with the St. Louis Cardinals in 1967.
Though he was known for being reserved away from the field, Maris left an outsized legacy. His 1961 season remains one of the most dramatic achievements in baseball history—not only because he surpassed Ruth’s record, but because he did so amid extraordinary public scrutiny.
Image: Roger Maris with President John F. Kennedy, via Wikimedia Commons, public domain.
