CACrown ArchivesThe cinema collection
Menu
Research dossier · People & Ideas

Wally Westlake

American baseball player (1920–2019)

Correspondence, annotated notebooks and portrait silhouettes prepared for research
People and ideasInterpretive dossier study · Crown Archives visual atlas
Record originEnglish Wikipedia
Text licenseCC BY-SA 4.0
Source revisionJul 28, 2026
Entity authorityQ7963515 ↗
Source-derived summary

Waldon Thomas Westlake (November 8, 1920 – September 5, 2019) was an American utility player in Major League Baseball who had a ten-year career from 1947 to 1956.

Career

Born in Gridley, California, Westlake played for the Pittsburgh Pirates, St. Louis Cardinals, Cincinnati Reds and Philadelphia Phillies of the National League, and the Cleveland Indians and Baltimore Orioles of the American League. He primarily played as an outfielder, with some appearances as a third baseman.

Westlake hit for the cycle twice in his career (both while playing for the Pirates), coming almost a year apart; July 30, 1948, against the Brooklyn Dodgers, and June 14, 1949, against the Boston Braves.

He was a member of the National League All-Star team in 1951, entering the game as a defensive replacement in the bottom of the 9th inning. He was traded along with Eddie Kazak from the Cardinals to the Reds for Dick Sisler and Virgil Stallcup on May 13, 1952.

Westlake was a member of the 1954 Cleveland Indians team, who were swept by the New York Giants in the 1954 World Series. He played in two games of the Series, batting 1-for-7 (.143) with one walk. Following the death of teammate Hal Naragon, Westlake was the last surviving player to play with the Indians in the 1954 World Series.

Editorial summary

The public source identifies “Wally Westlake” as american baseball player (1920–2019). This brief keeps that definition visible, then builds a research path around Wally, Westlake and American.

Editorial reviewStrongest as a route into the people, institutions and dated events that shaped the subject’s public record. The current lead gives the account dated anchors—1920, 2019, 1947, 1956—that can be checked directly. The linked authority record independently contributes the date 1920-11-08. Its value is orientation rather than verdict, with Wally, Westlake and American providing the first useful test.
Editorial analysis

Why this record matters

A short description can identify a subject without explaining its stakes. For “Wally Westlake”, the useful work is to connect “american baseball player (1920–2019)” to the records capable of establishing context and consequence.

Evidence profile

The entry’s evidential value lies in the named roles, institutions and publications that can be tested against primary documentation. The source revision retrieved here is dated Jul 28, 2026. The linked authority identifier is Q7963515. 1 of 1 selected statements include explicit references; 0 carry qualifiers and 0 use preferred rank. The first chronological checks are 1920, 2019, 1947 and 1956.

Critical limits

Later biographies can compress uncertainty and repeat inherited reputations, so apparently settled claims may still require comparison. The source lead contains qualifying language; that uncertainty should survive quotation, summary and reuse. Authority statements aid reconciliation but still require their own references, qualifiers and ranks to be checked.

How to read it

Read biographical claims against dates, named institutions and the cited references. Distinguish a subject’s later reputation from evidence produced during their lifetime.

Best used for
  • Establishing names and roles
  • Building a first chronology
  • Locating cited institutions
Verify next

Personal papers, civil or court records, institutional files and the scholarship cited by the source.

Three-step research path

  1. Establish the record: confirm the title “Wally Westlake”, its source revision and the description used here.
  2. Expand the search: follow Wally Westlake primary sources, Wally Westlake archive and Wally research across catalogues and specialist indexes.
  3. Test the account: compare the strongest cited source with the responsible institution’s current record and note any disagreement.

Questions for further research

  1. Which source most directly establishes the central claim about “Wally Westlake”?
  2. How has the subject’s reputation changed across later accounts?
  3. Which claims depend on a single source or contested interpretation?
Subject index

Search terms from this dossier

Source & attribution

This entry incorporates text from “Wally Westlake” on English Wikipedia. Contributors are listed in the page history. Text is available under the Creative Commons Attribution-ShareAlike 4.0 License. Selected authority identifiers and statements are retrieved from Wikidata under CC0; their references and qualifiers remain part of the verification path.