We all know about the dramatic World Series home run by Bill Mazeroski on Oct. 13, 1960 -- bottom of the ninth, Game 7 -- to lift the Pirates to a 10-9 victory over the mighty New York Yankees and a World Series title.

Maz's blast caused the biggest celebration of unbridled joy in Pittsburgh since the end of World War II, Some 300,000 people gathered Downtown that night.

Pittsburgh was starving for a championship. Mazeroski was the ultimate hero. But the 1960 Pirates were a team full of heroes. They won because they played as a team -- "a whole team playing to get that run in and not waiting for one or two guys to do it all," observed Philadelphia Phillies manager Gene Mauch.

Said Pirates manager Danny Murtaugh in the locker room after Game 7: "Who were the heroes? The whole group, everyone who played today and at any time during this season. This is a real team. A great team. I love all of them."

But to reach that season's stunning conclusion, the Pirates had to pass many tests. For me, the most memorable was Aug. 11-14, a five-game series at Forbes Field against the St. Louis Cardinals. The games exemplified the team play and indomitable spirit of the Pirates. Today, they can remind us of the hard work and dedication that underlines any great human accomplishment.

Consider the scene that August: The Cardinals were on a roll, having won 10 of their previous 12 games. They were in second place, five games behind the Bucs, who had hit a lull after the July 11-13 All-Star break. For the remainder of July, they had gone just 8-9 -- and even fell out of first place by percentage points on July 24.

They moved back into first the next day, but their lead over Milwaukee was just 2 1/2 games at the start of a crucial 18-game homestand on Aug. 2. The Bucs won eight of the first nine games to re-establish a cushion. The upcoming series against the Cardinals promised to be pivotal.

The series would feature a classic pitching duel that was decided by a 12th-inning home run by the Cardinals' Stan Musial; an exhibition in Charleroi featuring Musial, Ken Boyer, Bob Skinner, Dick Stuart and Dick Groat on Saturday night, with all the players donating their time for charity; great defense by the Pirates, including a trick play; huge crowds; and a display of courage and grit by Don Hoak that epitomized the fighting spirit of the 1960 Bucs.

The series got under way Thursday with a night game matching St. Louis ace Ernie Broglio against Bob Friend. A crowd of 34,212 was on hand. After 11 innings the score was tied at 1. Friend had allowed just one hit and retired 18 straight before the Cards tied it in the eighth inning. Broglio had set down 21 straight following a home run by Smokey Burgess in the fifth.

Pittsburgh's defense was scintillating. Bill Mazeroski gunned down Boyer at the plate in the ninth inning after taking a relay from right fielder Gino Cimoli, who had played the carom of a Musial drive into the corner perfectly. (Cimoli was playing in place of Roberto Clemente, who had been out since requiring five stitches to his chin and bruising his knee after making an incredible catch of a drive by the Giants' Willie Mays the previous Friday, when Clemente made a leaping, over-the-head grab and ran into the wall in right-center at full speed. He was momentarily knocked unconscious and was helped off the field holding a towel to his face that was soaked with his blood. The Post-Gazette's Jack Hernon called it "one of the finest plays ever pulled off at Forbes Field.")

Bill Virdon also made a spectacular catch of a long drive by Boyer in the 12th inning when he bounced off the wall in left-center, some 410 feet from home plate. Cardinals manager Solly Hemus called that catch "one of the best I've ever seen."

Bill White led off St. Louis' 12th inning with a single. After Virdon robbed Boyer, Stan the Man, who already had doubled twice, launched a blast into the upper deck in right field, making it 3-1. The Pirates scored a run with two out in the bottom half, but Broglio struck out Stuart to end it.

An overflow crowd of 35,439 saw the Cards win 9-2 Friday night behind a second-year pitcher named Bob Gibson to close within three games as Clemente returned to the lineup after missing six games but went 0 for 4.

Hemus warned in Saturday's Post-Gazette, "This pennant race is far from over."

There was trepidation in the air before the Saturday afternoon game. You could hear it in the worried chatter of 24,520 fans as they entered Forbes Field to watch a battle of southpaws -- Ray Sadecki vs. Harvey Haddix. The Cards got three hits and scored a run in the first, putting the crowd on edge, but the Bucs tied it in the bottom half on a triple by Groat and single by Clemente. The Kitten settled down and scattered just four more singles for a complete-game seven-hitter, the great Roberto went 3 for 5 with a two-run home run in the third and drove in all four runs, and Groat was 4 for 4 and scored twice.

That evening, Musial, Boyer, Stuart and Skinner drove to Charleroi to engage in a home run contest at Charleroi Stadium before a Little League All-Star Game, with all the proceeds going to Children's Hospital and the local Little League. Groat went along to pitch to the four.

Some 50 years later, Skinner recalled: "I was happy to do it. It was for a good cause, and Stan Musial, of course, was a hero to all of us. ... That he would come and do something for charity during the season -- no appearance fee or anything -- that just shows the type of person he is."

Recalled Groat, "Stan Musial not only was the best hitter in the National League, he was the best person in the league."

The result of the contest was one-sided: Musial and Boyer won 14-1. The participants then signed autographs before heading back to Pittsburgh. They had a doubleheader to play the next day.

Also on Saturday night, Hoak, Friend, Virdon and Cimoli attended a cookout and swimming-pool party when Hoak gashed the webbing between his second and third toes of his right foot on a metal ladder coming out of the pool. A doctor in attendance told him it would require several stitches and advised that he go to a hospital.

But Hoak didn't want to risk the story being made public, fearing that manager Danny Murtaugh would not let him play in the doubleheader. He asked the doctor to sew him up, but the doctor said he had no anesthetic on hand. No matter, just do it, said Hoak, who gritted his teeth and smoked a cigarette during the procedure, which required eight stitches. Hoak also swore Friend, Virdon and Cimoli to secrecy in order that he could play on Sunday.

A standing-room crowd of 36,775 turned out on Sunday, knowing what the stakes were. The Bucs had to win at least one game.

The crowd could relax after the Pirates won the first game 9-2 as Vernon Law, aided by three double plays, notched his 15th complete game despite surrendering 12 hits. It's not known how many pitches he threw. "We didn't keep pitch counts in those days," said the Deacon, the last man to work 18 innings in one game, as he did in 1955.

The nightcap was a humdinger. It was tied at 2 when the Cards put their first two batters on in the seventh. Joe Gibbon relieved Tom Cheney, and the Pirates knew St. Louis would be bunting with their No. 2 hitter, Joe Cunningham. So Hoak went to Gibbon and told him: "Whatever you do, throw Cunningham a strike on the first pitch. We have a trick play all set up for his bunt. But throw him a strike or we're going to look foolish. If the ball is bunted back to you, throw to third."

Hoak and Stuart charged hard, and Cunningham bunted toward third. Hoak picked it up, whirled and threw to Groat covering third, and he threw to Mazeroski covering first for a double play.

Today that play is called the "wheel play" and is in every team's repertoire, but in 1960 it was highly unusual. In Monday's paper, Pirates coach Mickey Vernon, whose major league career began in 1939, said he had never seen it before. Batting practice pitcher Virgil Trucks said it was the first time he had seen it in 18 years in the big leagues. Groat said he figured it would work because pitcher Curt Simmons, the runner at second, had been picked off second by the Pirates' ElRoy Face earlier in the season and would be extra cautious.

Simmons admitted he was "flabbergasted when I saw Groat run toward third. I didn't know what was going on."

The Pirates said they believed the play was first used by Cubs manager Charley "Jolly Cholly" Grimm (an ex-Pirate who should be in the Hall of Fame) in 1950, and Groat said the Bucs wanted to use the play a couple of years earlier when Bobby Bragan was their manager, but he wouldn't allow it. Murtaugh, who believed in an aggressive brand of baseball, did, but admitted he didn't know the Pirates were going to use it in this game. The Irishman said he almost fell off the bench when he saw the Bucs attempt the play but added admiringly, "Have you ever seen a money player like that Hoak?"

Said Pirates catcher Hal Smith some 50 years later: "That's the kind of manager Murtaugh was. He let us play. After that game he said, "I sure don't intend on being late for any games this year. I don't want to miss what you guys are going to do next."

The game remained tied into the 11th inning as Face worked a scoreless eighth and ninth, and Fred Green worked two scoreless innings. Stuart and Skinner singled in the bottom of the 11th, and Hoak drove in the winning run with a looping single to right-center. The lead was now a comfortable six games.

Hoak, who had to borrow a right shoe two sizes too big because of his swollen foot, waited in the dressing room until most players were gone before removing the shoe, which was filled with blood. He did not miss a game all season, and the story wasn't made public until revealed by Friend one day before the World Series because, "Hoak deserved credit for what he did." When asked why he, Virdon and Cimoli had kept Hoak's injury a secret at the time, Friend said: "Don asked us not to tell. ... He would have been taken out of the lineup. ... If Don wanted to try to play, the least we could do was let him try."

When Hoak was asked whether he would have revealed the injury had Friend not, he replied, "Hell no, and I wish he hadn't, either."

That's the spirit that led to a World Series victory. Mazeroski's triumphant home run in the last inning of the last game gets all the attention. But as Vernon Law says, "Don Hoak was the difference [in 1960]. He was the backbone. He had that fighting spirit that rubbed off on everyone. He just wouldn't let us lose."

The Pirates concluded the 14-4 homestand 7 1/2 games in front and remained in first place the rest of the season, their lead never falling below five games. They finished seven games in front of Milwaukee.

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