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Fans check out pictures of old Cleveland Indians at a temporary exhibit during the 1997 All-Star game festivities in Cleveland. Napoleon Lajoie is in the middle photograph.

(Chuck Crow, The Plain Dealer)

CLEVELAND, Ohio – A moment in baseball history: The Indians' name is a century old officially. A hundred years ago, on Jan. 16, 1915, the Cleveland Naps became the Cleveland Indians. The change came after the team's namesake, player-manager Napoleon Lajoie, left for Philadelphia.

The headline "Fans Will Help Select New Nickname for Naps" ran in The Cleveland Press on Jan. 7, 1915. Dozens were submitted, and on Jan. 17 The Plain Dealer ran a story about the announcement made a day earlier: "Indians Replace the Naps."

The Indians' Nap Lajoie.

Actually, sportswriters got together to come up with the name, referenced last year in an exhaustive story by Joe Posnanski, who grew up in Cleveland.

As the story goes, "Indians" supposedly referred to Louis Sockalexis, who played for the Cleveland Spiders from 1897 to 1899 and hit .313 over 94 games. But Posnanski, through methodical research, shows the nickname's connection is tenuous to Sockalexis, but not tied directly.

Sockalexis died in December 1913.

Lajoie was near the end of his career. His final game came Aug. 26, 1916. He played 21 years in the majors, including his stint in Cleveland from 1902-14, and was inducted into the Hall of Fame in 1937. He batted .338 and finished with 3,243 hits.

Lajoie, who once ran as Republican candidate for Cuyahoga County sheriff, died Feb. 7, 1959, at age 84.