Bill Veeck (65 page)

9
. Scott Jones,
The Doings
, January 9, 1986, 102.

10
. Veeck with Linn,
Veeck—as in Wreck
, 35.

11
. Scott Jones in
The Doings
, January 9, 1986, 102.

12
. Ibid.

13
.
Chicago American
, October 6, 1933.

14
. John Carmichael,
Chicago Daily News
biography, 1933.

15
. Warren Brown,
The Chicago Cubs
(New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1946), 109.

16
.
San Jose News
, December 8, 1931.

17
.
Chicago American
, October 5, 1933.

18
. Carmichael,
Chicago Daily News
biography, 1933.

19
. Donald Honig, comp.,
Baseball When the Grass Was Real: Baseball from the Twenties to the Forties Told by the Men Who Played It
(Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 1993), 137.

20
. Steve Gietschier, “Joe McCarthy: Architect of the Yankee Dynasty,”
Nine
15 (2006): 132.

21
. Newspaper accounts published after the game claimed that Ruth did indeed call his shot: “Ruth Calls Shot as He Puts Homer No. 2 in Side Pocket” (Joe Williams,
New York World-Telegram
); “Babe notified the crowd that the nature of his retaliation would be a wallop right out [of] the confines of the park” (John Drebinger,
New York Times
); “He pointed like a duelist to the spot where he expected to send his rapier home” (Paul Gallico,
New York
Daily News
); “Babe Calls His Shot” (Westbrook Pegler,
Chicago Sunday Tribune
). Quin Ryan, the Cubs broadcaster, told his radio audience: “That ball went out to almost the exact spot that Babe
had been pointing to.” Perhaps none of these accounts proves that Ruth pointed to center field to say “I'm hitting it there” and then did so, but that was the interpretation of some in the media who covered the game at the time.
Reach Official American League Base Ball Guide
for 1933 and
Spalding's Official Base Ball Guide
for 1933 assumed that Ruth called his shot.

22
. This version of the story was actually condensed from the
News
and appeared in
Baseball Digest
, November 1946, 8.

23
.
Chicago Tribune
, June 18, 1933;
Sporting News,
June 22, 1933, 8.

24
. Veeck with Linn,
Veeck—as in Wreck
, 36.

25
. Historian Arthur Schlesinger Jr. noted that Hoover's name became “a prefix charged with hate”—the newspapers the homeless used to cover themselves were “Hoover blankets,” farmers called jackrabbits “Hoover hogs,” and empty pockets pulled inside out were “Hoover flags.” The origin of the term may been a shantytown in Chicago that called itself Hooverville and had streets named Prosperity Road, Hard Times Avenue, and Easy Street. It came to national attention in 1930. “Chicago Jobless Colonize,”
New York Times
, November 12, 1930, 12.

26
.
Hartford Courant
, February 6, 1933.

27
.
New York Times
, February 6, 1933.

28
.
Philadelphia Tribune
, February 9, 1933.

29
.
Baltimore Afro-American
, February 18, 1933. Heydler's open-mindedness came into question later in the month when he said, “I do not recall one instance where baseball has allowed either race, creed or color to enter into the question of the selection of its players.”
Chicago Daily News
, February 25, 1933.

30
.
New York
Daily News
, February 8, 1933.

31
.
Pittsburgh Courier
, March 25, 1933.

32
. Jerrold Casway in
The National Pastime
15 (1995): 120–23.

33
.
Washington Post
, May 10, 1953.

34
.
Chicago American
, September 20, 1918.

35
. Later in this interview Veeck says of Gibson, “He was, at a minimum, two Yogi Berras.” Stephen Banker,
Black Diamonds: An Oral History of Negro Baseball
(Westport, CT: Meckler, 1989), cassette 3, side 2.

36
.
Baltimore Sun
, March 15, 1933, 10.

37
. Jerome Holtzman and George Vass,
Baseball, Chicago Style: A Tale of Two Teams, One City
(Chicago: Bonus Books, 2001), 99.

38
.
St. Joseph News-Press
, August 22, 1933, 4.

39
. AP,
Miami News
, August 22, 1933;
Chicago American
, August 4, 1933.

40
.
Chicago Daily News
, August 22, 1933.

41
. AP,
Hartford Courant
, August 24, 1933, 13;
Baltimore Sun
, August 24, 1933, 16.

42
. Alan J. Pollock,
Barnstorming to Heaven: Syd Pollock and His Great Black Teams
, ed. James A. Riley (Tuscaloosa: University of Alabama Press, 2006), 81.

43
. The
Amsterdam News
published the letter on September 13. It does not seem to have been published in any major non-black newspapers beyond North Tarrytown.

44
. Pollock,
Barnstorming to Heaven
, 81.

45
. Ibid.

46
.
Chicago Defender
, September 16, 1933.

47
.
Chicago Tribune
, September 26, 1933.

48
. Ibid. September 30, 1933.

49
.
Chicago American
, October 5, 1933.

50
. Ibid.

51
. Edward Linn,
A Great Connection: The Story of Molex
(Chicago: Regnery Gateway, 1988), 63. It almost turned into a circus, according to Mrs. Veeck's friend Jane Ostrum. “People went past his open coffin out into the yard, and all the Cub players were there, and all of Hinsdale still plus all kinds of horrible sightseers and reporters trying to sneak in through the bushes. It was terrible.”

52
.
Chicago American
, October 6, 1933.

53
. AP column by Alan Gould,
Reading (PA)
Eagle
, October 17, 1933.

54
. Minutes of the National League, December 12–13, 1933, 107–8, National Baseball Library.

1
.
New York Times
, October 29, 1933. The record of the 1933 team appears in the 2010 Kenyon Media Guide, which is online at
http://teamguides.kenyon.edu
.

2
. Peter Golenbock,
Wrigleyville: A Magical History Tour of the Chicago Cubs
(New York: St. Martin's, 1996), 277.

3
. Ibid.

4
. Ibid.

5
. Roger Angell,
Five Seasons:
A Baseball Companion
, (Lincoln, NE : Bison Books, 2004), 315; Bill Veeck with Edward Linn,
Veeck—as in Wreck
(New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1962), 83.

6
. Ray Kroc with Robert Anderson,
Grinding It Out: The Making of McDonald's
, 40.

7
.
Flood v. Kuhn
, Second Circuit Briefs and Records, Law Library, Library of Congress, Veeck testimony, 1956–57.

8
. Interview with Fred Krehbiel, June 3, 2010. Many references to Eleanor appear with an
-e
on the end of her name, especially early in her life, but legal papers she signed end the name with an
-r
.

9
.
Chicago Tribune
, August 5, 1935.

10
. Mary Margaret McBride column,
Palm Beach Post
, October, 1, 1935; interview with Scott Jones, November 2, 2010.

11
.
Chicago Herald-American
,
Chicago American
, and
Chicago Tribune
, all December 6, 1935.

12
. Interview with Scott Jones, November 2, 2010.

13
. Banker,
Black Diamonds
, cassette 3, side 2.

14
. Veeck with Linn,
Veeck—as in Wreck
, 182; “Historical Overview,” a handout given to ushers at Wrigley Field for the 2010 season, 115–16.

15
.
Baltimore Afro-American
, October 5, 1935, 18;
St. Joseph Gazette
, October 5, 1935, 17.

16
. Veeck's relationship with Saperstein is discussed in a number of places, including Banker,
Black Diamonds
, cassette 3, side 2.
The
Sporting
News called Saperstein the “Bill Veeck of basketball.”

17
. Robert W. Peterson,
Cages to Jump Shots: Pro Basketball's Early Years
(Lincoln: University of Nebraska Press, 2002).

18
.
Pittsburgh Press
, March 29, 1939.

19
. Peterson,
Cages to Jump Shots
, 70.

20
.
Sporting News
, undated clipping (annotated 1935), National Baseball Library.

21
.
Sporting News
, January 17, 1935.

22
. AP,
Anchorage News
, January 14, 1987.

23
. Veeck with Linn,
Veeck—as in Wreck
, 37.

24
. In his autobiography, Veeck remembered the colors as green for a win and red for a loss, but contemporary newspapers stated that the colors of the lights were blue and white, as they were in 2011.

25
.
Chicago Tribune
, September 12, 1937. The article on page B5 entitled “New Wrigley Field Blooms in Scenic Beauty—and Scoffers Rush to Apologize” is the most detailed I could find on Veeck's contribution. Also
Chicago Daily News
, June 26 and July 10, 1937;
Chicago Tribune
, July 10, 1937.

26
.
Chicago Tribune
,
Chicago American
,
Chicago Daily Times
, and
Chicago Herald-Examiner
, all July 30, 1938.

27
.
Pittsburgh Press
, August 4, 1938.

28
.
Chicago Tribune
, December 17, 1938.

29
.
Chicago Tribune
, April 21, 1940.

30
.
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
, August 17, 1938, 17.

31
. AP,
New York Times
and
Chicago Tribune
, November 15, 1940.

32
.
Chicago Herald-American
, November 14, 1940.

33
.
Dallas Morning News
, November 11, 1943.

34
. Harry Grayson in
Pittsburgh Press
, July 14, 1941.

35
. Warren Brown,
The Chicago Cubs
(New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1946), 227; Tommy Devine, “Boy from the Bleachers,”
Pic: The Magazine for Young Men
, April 1947, 111.

36
. Brown,
Chicago Cubs
, 196.

37
. Harry Grayson in
Pittsburgh Press
, July 14, 1941.

38
. Golenbock,
Wrigleyville
, 278.

1
. Charlie Grimm and Ed Prell,
Jolly Cholly's Story: Grimm's Baseball Tales
(Notre Dame, IN: Diamond Communications, 1983), 141.

2
.
Milwaukee Sentinel
, June 17, 1941, 6.

3
. These amounts are based on reports in the
Chicago Herald-American
and
Chicago Daily News
, both June 24, 1941; see also Grimm and Prell,
Jolly Cholly's Story
, 141.

4
. Warren Brown,
The Chicago Cubs
(New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1946), 195.

5
.
Sarasota Herald-Tribune
, June 24, 1941.

6
.
Chicago Daily News
, July 24, 1941.

7
.
Chicago Herald-American
, July 26, 1941.

8
.
Sportsfolio
, April 1949, 9.

9
.
Toledo Blade
, June 24, 1941, 18.

10
. Bill Veeck with Edward Linn,
Veeck—as in Wreck
(New York: G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1962), 85.

11
. Grimm and Prell,
Jolly Cholly's Story
, 143.

12
.
Look
, September 7, 1943.

13
.
Toledo Blade
, July 21, 1941, 16.

14
.
Chicago Defender
, August 23, 1953, 22.

15
.
Milwaukee Journal
, August 27, 1941, 3.

16
.
Montreal Gazette
, September 13, 1941.

17
.
Milwaukee Journal
, September 7, 1941.

18
.
Pittsburgh Courier
, March 24, 1962, A29. In this article Wendell Smith asserts that Saperstein stepped in and “probably saved Veeck's baseball career, as well as the Milwaukee franchise”, by pulling him out of his financial hole.

19
. Ibid;
Toledo Blade
, September 1, 1960, 34.

20
.
Washington Post
, November 6, 1941, 26. If Grimm got an offer at this point in his life, he neglected to mention it in his autobiography.

21
.
Schenectady Gazette
, January 3, 1942, 9.

22
. Peter Golenbock,
Wrigleyville: A Magical History Tour of the Chicago Cubs
(New York: St. Martin's, 1996), 277.

23
.
Pittsburgh Post-Gazette
, January 21, 1942, 14.

24
.
Time
, December 22, 1941.

25
. William B. Mead and Paul Dickson,
Baseball: The Presidents' Game
(New York: Walker, 1997), 76–79. The men behind the scenes were Clark Griffith, longtime owner of the Washington Senators, and Robert E. Hannegan, a crony and confidant of Roosevelt's who held the positions of Internal Revenue Service commissioner and Democratic national chairman during Roosevelt's administration. Griffith had been baseball's unofficial lobbyist for years—a role he carefully kept from Landis. Hannegan hailed from St. Louis and was a close friend of Sam Breadon's, owner of the Cardinals, and Don Barnes's and William DeWitt's, who owned the St. Louis Browns. After the war, Hannegan became part owner of the Cardinals—Stan Musial's boss, so to speak.