“Goat Accepts Wrigley Apology; Hex Off Cubs” (Headline). Minneapolis Star, September 22, 1950, p44
“Goat Hex is Gone So Cubs Should Win.” (Headline). Ken Opstein, Muncie Evening Press January 5, 1951, p11
“Baseball has spawned the ‘Black Sox’ and the Bleacher Bums and Billy Goat’s Curse.” Tom Hansen, The World [Suburban Chicago], April 11, 1976, p19
“They’re under the ‘Billy Goat Curse’.” (Tagline above the headline). Tampa Tribune, June 18, 1977, p15.
NOTES: The 1950 and 1951 articles about Wrigley’s apology are from the INS news service and appeared in several papers. They are the earliest references to the curse, or hex. The 1976 and 1977 articles are the first to use the phrases “Billy Goat’s Curse” and “Billy Goat Curse.” (Ken Liss)
Previous earliest use (Dickson Baseball Dictionary, 3rd edition, 2009):
2003. “A suppressed ‘billy goat’ curse that inspired the Chicago Tribune headline on Thursday [Oct. 16, 2003]: ‘The Bleat Goes On’” (The New York Times, Oct. 17).
