Literary birthday greetings

December 13, 2010

A whole bunch today, beginning with Fergie Jenkins, the Hall of Fame pitcher, who turns 68. You often read about how dark-skinned Hispanics players such as Robert Clemente or Vic Power were amazed by the prejudice they encountered in the 1950s and 1960s, coming from countries where none existed. I wonder how Jenkins felt, coming down from the Great North? No doubt he discusses this in Fergie: My Life from the Cubs to Cooperstown, which came out last year. He also published Like Nobody Else: The Fergie Jenkins Story in 1973. The cover looks the same as Dorothy Turcotte’s The Game Is Easy — Life Is Hard: The Story of Ferguson Jenkins, Jr., which was published in 2003 by the Fergie Jenkins Foundation. Hmm.

Other books on Jenkins — who won 20 or more games for six straight seasons) — include Stanley Pashko’s 1975 publication Ferguson Jenkins: The Quiet Winner.

You can’t pick up a book about the Brooklyn Dodgers without major props to Carl Erskine, who turns 86 today. One of The Boys of Summer, “Oisk” published What I Learned From Jackie Robinson: A Teammate’s Reflections On and Off the Field in 2005 and lent his named to the Dodger’s version of Sports Publishing’s team anecdotal series withCarl Erskine’s Tales from the Dodgers Dugout: Extra Innings.

Also marking a birthday: Larry Doby, generally recognized as the second African-America to play in the Major Leagues, was born this date in 1923. Even though his lot could not have been any easier than Jackie Robinson’s there is a shameful dearth of books about him, the most “popular” of which is Joseph Thomas Moore’s Pride Against Prejudice: The Biography of Larry Doby. He is, however, the subject of a well-done documentary by the same name.

Personal connection: Doby lived in my town of Montclair and his grandson attends school with my daughter. He’s on the school’s baseball team, of which my daughter serves as a manager/photographer.

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Tagged as: Carl Erskine, Ferguson Jenkins, Larry Doby

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