I visited Chicago a couple of weeks ago to celebrate my brother-in-law’s 50th. He’s a life long Cubs fan (from Saskatoon, Saskatchewan!) so we spent most of the weekend at Wrigley. I got totally caught up in the Cubs lore and the Wrigley vibe. But it made me wonder one thing --> how do Chicagoans decide whether they’re Cubs fans or White Sox fans? Is it the neighborhood you live in? Is it who your family is? Is it class or race influenced? Having never lived in a place with two professional teams in one sport, I’m fascinated with this. How did any of you decide which team to throw your support behind?
Cubs is north side, White Sox is south side. If you live in the middle, you get to choose.
I was born/raised North, but my family, who never resided South, has always been partial to the Sox. It was sometime in the 1930’s that my granparents brought one of their kids to Cook County Hospital. As the story goes, one of the Sox players patted the crying kid on the head. Thus a North Side family of Sox fans was born.
My wife’s family are all Sox fans, but they come from the north side (Portage Park). Apparently, my grandfather-in-law started out as a Cubs fan, but wound up working as a machinist at Stewart Warner, and many of his co-workers were Sox fans. Eventually, he converted.
(Me? I’m a Brewers fan. I’m from the far, far, FAR North Side. 
)
For me, it was mostly because the Cubs were on WGN Channel 9 when I was a kid, and we got a nice clear picture on our giant, state-of-the-art 21" Zenith color TV. Plus, they played day games, when we kids were in charge of the program selection. Thus, I grew up with Jack Brickhouse, Ernie Banks, Billy Williams, Ron Santo, et al, as a part of my daily life for half the year. (And Bozo, of course. But that’s another thread.)
I never hated the Sox (that seems to be a pattern; Sox fans despise the Cubs but not vice-versa), but to watch a Sox game, we had to fiddle with the UHF antenna and hope the weather was right to get a passable – but always snowy – picture on the weak-signaled Channel 44. The White Sox were therefore always “the other team” to me.
I came in to say the same thing. WGN brought the Cubs into a lot of homes at very impressionable ages for many of us. I see a lot of Braves fans my age (WTBS) for the same reason.
I also agree with the fact that most of my friends who are cubs fans only hate the Sox when the two teams play. I never understood the hatred from the south side directed to the north. Perhaps it has more to do with economics than baseball?
It goes back to the days when the Cubs and Bears were the northside teams and the Sox and Cardinals were the southside teams and that’s the way it was.
My father grew up on the southside, so he rooted for the Sox and the Cardinals. Then the family moved out to Des Plaines. Since most everyone out there were Cubs fans, he kept quiet. Later on, his company got box seats for the Sox, so he could be a fan again. After he retired, he mostly watched TV, so it was back to the Cubs.
But while my father had a deep affection for Santo and Banks, he couldn’t stand to listen to Jack Brickhouse, so his loyalties were always conflicted.
Same here, with another point against the Sox: our color TV didn’t have a UHF antenna. We had at least one B&W that could get UHF but what kid with access to a color TV wants to watch baseball in B&W?
Speaking as a north side Sox fan, I can tell you at least one Cubs fan was cheering for them to lose the 2005 Series - my youngest. After the Sox had kicked butt, the kid dressed up for Halloween with a devil’s horns and trident - and White Sox shirt and cap. I went around with him trick-or-treating. Half the people who answered the door stared at him blankly - presumably these were badminton fans. The other half busted a gut.
And sadly, in those days seeing a therapist about internal conflicts still held a stigma.
Yep, being born and spending my early childhood in Back of the Yards before moving about two miles west to Archer Heights, I was geographically predestined to be a White Sox fan. This area is deeply Sox Country. However, my parents, both being Polish immigrants, had no interest in baseball and didn’t expose me or influence my fandom. Back in the late 70s and early 80s, Cubs baseball was still all day games at home, and all were broadcast by WGN. The sport completely mesmerized and engrossed me and I would watch games almost every single day. Hence, due to the Cubs omnipresence on the airwaves, I became a Cub fan. I don’t even remember Sox games being on that much and, if I recall correctly, most games were only available on the pay TV station Sportsvision.
I never hated the Sox and, in fact, almost all my earliest baseball memories were going to Comiskey Park (I miss that place.) My ratio of attending Sox to Cubs games was in the range of 10:1 up until college. I still probably have been to more Sox games.
It’s a bit odd now as Cub fans are more out in the open here in the South Side. Used to be you’d never see Cub paraphernalia in a bar on the South Side, yet now it’s quite common.