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Yogi Berra caught 14 seasons for the Yankees, winning 10 World Series rings and making 15 All-Star teams.
A bricklayer's son from St. Louis, he left school to work in coal yards before baseball.
His speaking style—"It ain't over till it's over"—made him famous beyond sports—where he later managed both Yankees and Mets to pennants.
In 1938, thirteen-year-old Yogi Berra walked out of his St. Louis classroom and dropped out.
His Italian immigrant parents needed money for rent and food.
That evening, he traded his textbooks for a job at a coal yard, lifting hundred-pound sacks onto delivery trucks.
Each week, he handed his $6 paycheck to his mother.
While his classmates conjugated verbs and solved algebra equations, Berra spent his afternoons on the sandlots, where he developed the quick hands and keen eye that would later make him a Hall of Fame catcher for the New York Yankees.
Bobby Hofman spotted his friend Larry Berra sitting cross-legged on the dirt baseball diamond in their St. Louis neighborhood.
The year was 1936.
As Berra waited for his turn at bat, Hofman noticed how his friend's posture matched the pictures he'd seen of Hindu holy men in meditation.
"You look just like a yogi," Hofman told him.
The nickname stuck and he’d be known as Yogi Berra since that moment.
Yogi Berra joined the U.S. Navy in 1943 when he turned 18.
As a gunner's mate on the USS Bayfield, Berra manned a 20mm machine gun during the D-Day invasion.
His ship anchored 300 yards off Omaha Beach on June 6, 1944, where he fired at German planes and watched Allied forces storm the Normandy coast.
Years later, as he accepted his Hall of Fame plaque in Cooperstown.
In 1942, the St. Louis Cardinals held a tryout at Sportsman's Park.
Two teenage catchers from The Hill neighborhood arrived: Joe Garagiola and Lawrence "Yogi" Berra.
After watching both players, Cardinals scouts signed Garagiola for $500, passing on Berra.
Five years later, Berra was recruited to play for the New York Yankees, beginning an 18-year career.
Garagiola played nine seasons, batted .257, and retired in 1954 having never made an All-Star team.
The Cardinals' decision cost them the greatest catcher of his generation.
Yogi Berra caught for the Yankees from 1946 to 1963, helping the team win 14 American League pennants.
He crouched behind home plate for 1,699 games, guiding pitchers through crucial moments and tagging out runners at the plate.
In October baseball, Berra hit 12 World Series home runs and caught 63 Fall Classic games, more than any other catcher.
His 10 championship rings represent 10 distinct Yankees teams he steered to victory—from the 1947 squad featuring Joe DiMaggio to the 1962 team led by Mickey Mantle.
When Berra hung up his catcher's mitt after the 1963 season, he had caught more World Series games than some franchises have played in their entire history!
Yogi Berra earned $65,000 at his peak with the Yankees in 1957—about $640,000 in today's money.
Berra won three MVP awards and appeared in 15 All-Star games during his career.
Yet his paychecks remained small because players couldn't negotiate on the open market until 1975.
On October 3, 1947, Yogi Berra hit a pinch-hit home run in Game 3 of the World Series at Ebbets Field.
The 22-year-old Yankees backup catcher, who had played in just 83 games that season, faced Dodgers pitcher Ralph Branca in the seventh inning with the Yankees trailing 9-8.
Berra drove Branca's first pitch over the right field wall, tying the game at 9-9.
Though the Yankees ultimately lost the game 9-8.
Yogi Berra turned verbal mistakes into an art form.
His twisted phrases — like "Nobody goes there anymore, it's too crowded" — made fans laugh and think twice.
While other athletes gave rehearsed interviews, Berra spoke in memorable tangles that stuck in people's minds.
In 1998, he gathered his most quoted sayings in "The Yogi Book: I Really Didn't Say Everything I Said."
Yogi Berra's sons built distinct athletic careers.
Dale Berra played infield in Major League Baseball for eleven seasons (1977-1987), wearing the uniforms of the Pittsburgh Pirates, New York Yankees, and Houston Astros.
Tim Berra played wide receiver for the Baltimore Colts, catching passes during the 1974 NFL season.
Yogi Berra appeared in TV commercials and print ads from 1950 to 1990, selling everything from chocolate drinks to cat food.
In 1957, he became the face of Dr Pepper’s Yoo-Hoo, appearing in TV spots where he drank the chocolate beverage straight from the bottle while wearing his Yankees uniform.
Pepsi featured him in their 1970s "Catch the Pepsi Spirit" campaign, where he demonstrated his famous "fork in the road" logic in 30-second spots.
When Kraft launched their Italian dressing in 1981, they put Berra's smiling face on every bottle, playing up his Italian-American heritage.
His most unusual venture came in 1975 with a cologne bearing his name—a spicy scent that promised to make men "smell like winners."
Puss 'n Boots cat food hired him in 1965 to tell viewers that even finicky cats preferred their brand, playing on his nickname and casual charm.
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