The NL opened the West Coast and Southeastern United States territories by approving the transfers of the Los Angeles Dodgers and San Francisco Giants in , and the Atlanta Braves in . Giles' first full season, , had been the last in which the eight-team league operated in the same cities as it had since . In March 1953, the Braves pulled up stakes in Boston, where they had played since 1876 as a charter member of the National League, and moved to Milwaukee. That transfer—initially wildly successful, although the Braves would stay in Milwaukee only 13 seasons before settling in Atlanta—was the first in the series of franchise moves that shook Major League Baseball for the next two decades.