Start by reading newspaper accounts from the time that tell the dramatic events, starting with "Merkle's Bonehead Play," that led to the playoff game for the National League pennant.

The September 23 "Merkle Game" that ended in a stalemate left New York and Chicago tied for first with the Pittsburgh Pirates just a game behind.
The three clubs stayed neck-and-neck down the stretch, each holding the top spot for a day or two until the trio were tied again after the games of October 1. The Cubs and Pittsburgh Pirates have identical 95-55 records (.633) with the Giants at 94-54 (.635). Chicago and Pittsburgh have four games left in the 154-game schedule while New York has six remaining.

Friday, October 2
The Pirates sweep a doubleheader at St. Louis to run their winning streak to eight.
The Cubs win in Cincinnati 5-0.
The Giants defeat the Phillies in Philadelphia 7-2.
Standings: Pittsburgh leads both the Chicago and New York by 1/2 game.
That evening, National League President Harry Pulliam finally renders his decision on the disputed September 23. He upholds the umpires' ruling of a tie game that could not be continued because the field could not be cleared of fans celebrating what they thought was a Giant victory.
Saturday, October 3
The Pirates beat the Cardinals for the sixth straight time.
The Cubs complete their sweep of the Reds, 16-2.
The Giants lose to the Phillies 3-2 as Harry Coveleski outduels NY's ace Christy Mathewson.
Pittsburgh leads by a half game over the Cubs with the Giants 1.5 back. However, McGraw's club is not eliminated since they still have three games with the Boston Doves.
Sunday, October 4
Since the City of Brotherly Love does not allow baseball on Sundays, the Giants are idle.
The Pirates travel to Chicago for their 154th and final game. It is #153 for the Cubs. A record crowd of 30,247 at the West Side Grounds sees the Cubs win 5-2.
The Cubs leap frog the Pirates to lead by 1/2 game. The Giants trail by 1 1/2. With Chicago finished its schedule, the only chance the New Yorkers have is to win their remaining three games against the Doves at the Polo Grounds to tie the Cubs.

And that's exactly what the Giants do, sweeping the Doves 8-1, 4-1, and 7-2. The standings look like this.

Team	W	L	%	GB
Chicago Cubs	98	55	.641	--
New York Giants	98	55	.641	--
Pittsburgh Pirates	98	56	.636	1/2

So the controversial Merkle game must be replayed Thursday, October 8. It is in effect a one-game playoff for the pennant and a trip to the World Series against the Detroit Tigers. The Pirates, their schedule complete, are eliminated because they will finish one game behind the winner and tied for second with the loser.
Anticipating a Giant victory in the final game in Boston, the sixteen Cub players - including player-manager Frank Chance - along with club president Charles Murphy, his treasurer, and newspaper reporters leave for New York at 2:30 PM October 7 to a rousing sendoff by hundreds of fans. The Cubs disembark on a beautiful fall day into a city of 4,000,000 that is seething with animosity and focused on the game at the Polo Grounds. Animosity because the September 23 game was "stolen" from their beloved Giants on a "technicality." Focused because scores of New Yorkers are skipping work or school to watch the game any way they can, either in the park or from vantage points outside the stadium. Thousands of Giants fans greet them "with vile names and obscene language." C Johnny Kling recalled: "They called us everything they could think of and some things we have never heard before." Ace P Mordecai Brown and 2B Johnny Evers (who realized Merkle had not touched 2nd as the apparent winning run scored September 23) have received death threats as well as Johnny's mother. Giants President John T. Brush hires 50 special policemen to go with the 300 police and five mounted men assigned to the game by the Police Commissioner. To counteract scalpers, Brush decides to have no advance ticket sales and to wait until 11 AM to open the box office. The strategy is partially successful at best. Over 5,000 people are in line by 10 AM. The game is sold out by noon, including seats in the partially completed addition to the grandstand that will eventually seat 2,500. Dozens of fights break out as ticket holders push their way through the throng into the park. Hundreds of fans are battered. Many without tickets get in, and many with tickets don't before the gates to the Polo Grounds close at 12:45 by order of the police. More altercations occur when men who purchased a ticket from a scalper realize they've wasted their money and track down the speculator. Half a dozen ambulances are dispatched to the scene, each loaded with doctors. Numerous spectators are hauled out of the stadium and conveyed to the West 153d street police station. About 2 PM, frustrated fans topple a 75' section of fence. Thousands surge through the gap into the park despite getting soaked by firehoses. Thepolice finally stop the intrusion. The writer for the New York Evening Telegraph estimates the crowd "surging in and around the Polo Grounds" to be "fully a quarter of a million" - "the largest crowd ever gathered in the world for a sporting event." He adds, "There were fully twice as many persons immediately outside the fence around the grounds as there were inside, and every foothold and balancing handhold on structures of every kind with even a glimpse of the grounds was fiercely held against any newcomer. From the press box the skyline everywhere was human heads. They were located on grandstand, roofs, fences, 'L' structures, electric light poles and in the distance on smokestacks, chimneys, advertising signs and copings of apartment houses." Another report says, "For nearly a mile there was a mass of people lining stairs, viaducts, streets, Speedway, bluffs, crags, rocks, peaks, grass, plots, trees, and any other available space ..." Two die and more are injured in falls from precarious perches that allowed them to see into the stadium.
Thousands climb up Coogan's Bluff, a promontory overlooking the Polo Grounds from beyond the 1B grandstand. Fans watch every Giant game for free from up there, but today the number is so large that not all can see, which causes more jostling when one of the regulars finds someone else in his usual spot. The crowd inside and outside the Polo Grounds included an unprecedented number of women.

1st Inning

• Despite his trepidations, Mathewson disposes of the Cubs quickly. Changing speeds, he strikes out Jimmy Sheckard and Frank Schulte on either side of Johnny Evers grounding out 4-3.
  As the Giants come to bat, the sound of a trumpet pierces the din made by horns, megaphones, and human voices. The trumpeter is playing "Taps." The crowd laughs, assuming the song is aimed at the Cubs.
• Pfiester doesn't fare as well in his first inning as Matty. Jack's pitch pitch hits Fred Tenney on the arm, provoking a great roar from the massive throng. Then the rattled southpaw walks Buck Herzog on four pitches. Jack settles down and fans Roger Bresnahan. C Kling intentionally drops the ball and pretends to look for it. Taking the bait on a ploy Chicago has practiced all season, Herzog strays off first and is picked off by Kling's snap throw. To rub salt in Buck's wound, the next batter, Mike Donlin, smashes the ball down the RF foul line for two bases, scoring Tenney. Lost in the hubbub is Chance's yelling that the ball was foul. When Pfiester walks Cy Seymour, the Peerless Leader has seen enough. After a long conference on the mound, probably to give Brown more time to warm up, he makes the call to the bullpen. The crowd goes wild with joy as the dejected ex-Giant killer trudges to the dugout, yelling on the way at Klem for his tight strike zone. But the fans' joy is short-lived. The three-fingered reliever strikes out Art Devlin and strides to the visitors' dugout to a chorus of vile names from the spectator. Giants 1 Cubs 0
  A smile can be seen on Fred Merkle's face as he tries to hide behind the water cooler in the home dugout. A Giants victory will reduce his bonehead play to a mere footnote in baseball history.

2nd Inning

• Chance leads off with a single to LF but is immediately picked off on "a lightning throw" from Matty. The Chicago manager argues with Johnstone for five minutes, throwing his cap into the dust and stomping on it. The umpire twice threatens to kick Chance from the game. As Frank finally walks to the dugout, the on deck batter, Solly Hofman, throws his bat on the ground. He has said nothing, but his act is evidently thought more seriously than his manager's, at least by home plate umpire Klem, who kicks Hofman out of the game. Mathewson then records his third and fourth Ks, fanning Harry Steinfeldt and Hofman's replacement, Solly Howard.
• The Cubs defense is on display this half inning. First, RF Schulte helps Brown with fine catches of hard line drives off the bats of Moose McCormick and Al Bridwell. Then SS Joe Tinker makes a fine stop of Matty's hard grounder.

3rd Inning

• As happens about 1/9 of the time, the player who made a fine play to end the previous inning leads off the next inning. Before pitching to Tinker, who has given him trouble in the past, Mathewson waves his CF Seymour further back, but Cy pays no heed. Matty tries to throw a curve low and inside. Instead, the ball sails down the middle of the plate. The Cubs SS smashes it to deep LCF. Seymour gets on his horse and races after the ball and makes a leap for it but just misses a catch that would have been easy had he been 10' further back. Then Cy compounds his mistake with another. Instead of letting the ball roll into the crowd for a ground rule double, he picks it up and throws too late to third to get Tinker. Kling follows with a liner to LF to tie the game. Brown bunts the runner over before Sheckard hits a fly that Seymour, playing where he belongs this time, catches for the second out. But before Matty gets the third out, the Cubs push across three more runs. He pitches carefully to Evers, Chicago's leading hitter at .300, and doesn't mind when Johnny walks to bring Schulte to the plate.
  RF Schulte, injured a third of the season, is hitting only .236, by far his lowest average in his four seasons with Chicago. The league leader in triples in 1906 knows he is a better hitter than his average shows and is perturbed that Matty pitched around Evers to get to him. Calm and unexcitable by nature, Schulte is not in awe of facing the game's greatest pitcher at this crucial moment.
  Schulte smacks a double into the crowd down the 3B line, scoring Kling and sending Evers to third. Chance then piles on when he loops an inside curve over 1B for another double to knock in two more runs. McGraw stays with "Big Six," who strikes out Steinfelt. Cubs 4 Giants 1
• Tenney gets the inning started with a clean single, the first hit off Brown. After Herzog fouls to Kling, Bresnahan singles to RF. But Donlin forces Bresnahan at 2nd, and Seymour sends a groan through the crowd with a fly to Sheckard.
  

• Howard fans to start a three-up, three-down inning.
• The Giants also go down 1-2-3.

5th Inning

• Bridwell handles Brown's grounder and throws him out at first to start another 1-2-3 inning.
• Mathewson hits the ball solidly, but Steinfeldt runs it down. Three up, three down again.

6th Inning

• With one out, Chance smacks his third hit only to have Bresnahan nail him trying to steal 2nd with a perfect throw to Herzog. Steinfeldt follows with a single, but Howard strikes out again.
• Tinker throws out Bresnahan. Donlin and Seymour fly out.

7th Inning

• Tinker flies to LF. Kling strikes out, and Mathewson throws out his counterpart.
• The stretching crowd chants "Giants lucky seventh." Devlin raises their hopes with a solid single. With the Cubs expecting a bunt, McCormick raises the decibel level with a clean hit to RF. Thinking that McGraw will surely bunt now, Brown pitches too carefully to Bridwell, walking him to fill the bases with none out and creating a roar in which "an explosion of dynamite would not have been heard."
  Chance walks to the mound to ask his ace if anything is wrong. "Not a damn thing," snarls Brown. "Gimme the ball and get back over there where you belong."
  The crowd groans when McGraw sends Larry Doyle to bat from Mathewson. Although Doyle has hit Brown well during the season, the choice is surprising since Larry has not faced an opposing pitcher in a game since breaking his thumb September 8.
  If McGraw considered pinch hitting Merkle, he probably dismissed the idea quickly. Fred hit a respectable .268 in 49 plate appearances, but another failure in a crucial situation would destroy the distraught 19-year-old.
  The Cubs play their infield at double play depth, willing to concede a run to get two outs. With the count 1-1, Doyle reaches for a low curve and fouls to Kling, who makes the catch despite a rain of bottles, hats, newspapers, and cushions. Tenney sends a run home with a long sacrifice fly to Schulte. Tinker then throws out Herzog. Have the Giants squandered their last best chance to catch up? Cubs 4 Giants 2

8th Inning

• Hooks Wiltse takes the mound with the obvious task of preventing any more Chicago scoring. After Sheckard whiffs, Evers doubles to LF, then moves to 3rd when Tenney fumbles Schulte's grounder. Chance drives a fly to McCormick, who guns down Evers at the plate with a superb throw.
• "By this time the sun was dropping below the hills and a chill air of gloom was enveloping the surrounding throng." Brown throws out Bresnahan. Donlin hits a liner that Sheckard tracks down. Seymour taps out 6-3.

9th Inning

• Steinfeldt strikes out for the third time. Howard flies to Devlin, and Tenney handles Tinker's foul pop.
  The game is disrupted by a number of fights in the crowd and by numerous fans cutting across the outfield to reach the gate.
• Brown sets down the Giants on just four pitches. Devlin grounds out 5-3. McCormack hits a high fly to Sheckard, and Tinker grabs Bridwell's grounder and wings the ball to Chance to complete the victory.
  FINAL SCORE: Cubs 4 Giants 2

Postgame

As the Giants leave the field quietly, the Cubs try to evade a swarm of unhappy fans.

• Tinker, Howard, and Sheckard are hit by flying objects. Pfiester is slashed on his shoulder.
• Two men bowl over two cops and knock down Chance from behind, causing a torn cartilage in his neck. Policemen get him to his feet and help Frank, Pfiester, and Kling push through the throng to the clubhouse. Finding their clubs ineffective, the officers pull their revolvers, and the crowd stands back. An attendant in the clubhouse throws open the door, and the players are thrown inside, and the door closed. A "little policeman" defends the door despite stones, pieces of boards and water cans hurled at him. Inside, two doctors from an ambulance treat the Chicago manager.
• Another top target is Evers, who rushes to the clubhouse from 2B to elude some "hard-looking fellows" who surround him but don't attack him. Johnny finds out later that his cousin arranged the escort with a New York gang.
• When all the Cubs reach the clubhouse, they barricade themselves against a mob that is breaking the windows and hurling themselves against the door.
• The players slip out one or two at a time to escape attention, just as they journeyed to the stadium that morning.
  Within minutes of receiving the good news by telegraph, jubilant Cub fans rush into the streets of the Windy City shouting for joy and throwing their hats. Many wave flags bearing the new Cubs logo, a bear inside a C, that adorns the Cubs' uniforms. A conga line forms, growing until it covers several blocks. Special newspaper editions are quickly produced and soon litter the streets.

The scene is quite different in the Giants clubhouse.

• Seymour lies on the floor crying over his misplay of Tinker's triple.
• Devastated, Matty sits on his stool, head in hands. He led the league in wins (37), strikeouts (259), ERA (1.43) and shutouts (11). But he will consider this his most disappointing season because he lost the deciding game. When he finally leaves, he tells the few remaining fans, "I did the best I could, but I guess fate was against me."
• McGraw issues this statement: "The game speaks for itself. There is nothing for me to say about today's play, but I hope that if we win the pennant again next year, as we did this year, we will be allowed to keep it. Every man on the team has done his best, and no man could do more than that."

Aftermath

• The Cubs went directly by train that evening from New York to Detroit for the World Series, which they won easily four games to one. That serves to make the Giants and their fans even more unhappy.
• John McGraw claimed to his dying day that he won eleven NL pennants, not the ten recorded in the record book.
• President Brush had medals struck for his players inscribed to "The Real Champions, 1908." He turned all the receipts from the game, $10,000, to the players to distribute among themselves. He also staged a benefit concert at the Academy of Music October 18 that brought in another $3,700.
• But, if polled, the Giants, to a man, would have preferred the World Series title and the money that went with it even if it was less than they received from Brush and the concert.

1908 National League and World Series Champion Chicago Cubs