Hall of Athletic Honor
He is one of the few collegiate baseball players in history to start in the major leagues right out of college. Plank did not graduate from Gettysburg, but played for the baseball team in the spring of 1900. The following year, Connie Mack hired him to Philadelphia. He made the team, but did return to Gettysburg to pitch the last two games of the 1901 season.
For 14 years the left-handed Plank pitched for the Athletics, helping the team win six American League pennants and three world series. In 1915, he left the Athletics and played for St. Louis Browns until retiring in 1917. In 1946, Plank was elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown, N.Y., as one of the greatest southpaw hurlers of all time and a 300-game winner.
Shortly after his death in 1926, the College named its new gymnasium in his memory.
