for 20 years of my early life." Williams was born on August 30, 1918 in San Diego, California. Growing up during the Great Depression, he played pickup baseball in a neighborhood park year-round. His mother worked tirelessly for the Salvation Army and his father ran a passport photography shop and worked late hours, allowing young Williams the freedom to play ball until dark. He even took his bat to school. He was a tall, thin teenager who pitched and played outfield in junior high school, American Legion and sandlot teams, and at Herbert Hoover High School. In his autobiography,
My Turn at Bat,, Williams said "there was nobody who had any more opportunities than I had, along with the God-given physical attributes and the intense desire."
As a teenager, Williams learned not to swing at balls that were out of the strike zone. Try as they might, pitchers could never get him to chase bad pitches. "Getting on base is how you score runs," Williams explained. "Runs win ball games. I walked a lot in high school, and in the minors I walked 100 times. ... You start swinging at pitches a half-inch outside, the next one's an inch out and pretty soon you're getting nothing but bad balls to swing at."
Williams began his professional career with the San Diego Padres, then a minor league team, in 1936.
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