Ron Kaplan's Baseball Bookshelf
If it fits on a bookshelf, it fits here.
From the category archives:
The March 31 episode of All Things Considered considered the story of the 140-year-old organ at St. Malachy Church in Philadelphia, which was damaged when the ceiling collapsed 12 years ago, damaging. Now, a fundraiser for the organ’s repair will have a baseball theme because the original builder’s grandson wrote the words to Take Me […]
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The Story of the Sensational Baseball Song, by Amy Whorf McGuiggan. University of Nebraska Press, 2009. This slim volume would seem to be the companion for last year’s Baseball Greatest Hit. While the latter was almost a who’s who, what;’s what and where’s where of the game’s unofficial anthem, McGuiggan’s slim volume concentrates more on […]
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Because you can frame the ticket stubs and put them on the bookshelf…Or simply the book, The Year the Yankees Lost First The Pennant, by Douglas Wallop, on which the musical was based. So, a remake of Damn Yankees, starring Jim Carrey as the Devil and Jake Gyllenhaal as “Shoeless Joe from Hannibal, Mo?” Seems […]
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From our friend Greg Spira comes this link to LibraryJournal.com’s annual baseball feature. Among the usual share of biographies and memoirs, histories, and social commentaries are such themes as: Yet another biography about Yogi Berra, this one by homonymic author Allen Barra, and one on Walter O’Malley by Michael D’Antonio Ira Berkow’s bio of Lou […]
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Terry Cashman’s most popular hits had to be “Talkin’ Baseball” and “Willie, Mickey, and the Duke,” a paean to New York centerfielders. But a close third was “Play-by-Play (I Saw it on the Radio).” The (Transplanted) Nation blog (Red Sox), posted this entry about how Bobby Thompson’s home run, as broadcast on radio and TV, […]
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Spitball Magazine just announced the finalists for the 2008 CASEY Award, Almost a Dynasty: The Rise and Fall of the 1980 Phillies, by William Kashatus (University of Pennsylvania Press) Neil Leifer: Ballet in the Dirt: The Golden Age of Baseball, by Neil Leifer (Taschen) (See here for samples.) Baseball’s Greatest Hit: The Story of “Take […]
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GlideMagazine.com ran this glowing review of the musical CD on various aspects of the game. The tunes (some of which are R-rated) include odes to Ted Williams, Curt Flood, Joe DiMaggio, and Sandy Koufax. Volume 1: Frozen Ropes and Dying Quails
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VH1 used to run a program called “Pop Up Videos,” where they would “balloon in” factoids about the hot musical numbers of the day. ESPN The Magazine does something similar in print with “Take Me Out to The Ball Game,” which celebrates its centennial this year. The piece features the two main versions, written in […]
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The Sacramento Bee’s Bruce Dancis elaborates a bit on the book marking the 100th anniversary of the game’s unofficial anthem, “Take Me Out to the Ball Game.” The Houston Chronicle also takes an in-depth look at the iconic ditty.
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The Story of Take Me Out to the Ball Game by Andy Strasberg, Bob Thompson, and Tim Wiles. Hal Leonard, 2008. This year marks the centennial of what baseball fans believe to be the true “national anthem” and this trio of authors have done the ditty proud. Baseball’s Greatest Hit is an “everything you always […]
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Baseball’s real anthem celebrates its centennial this year, a fact marked by the new book, Baseball’s Greatest Hit: The Story of Take Me Out to the Ball Game, by Tim Wiles, Andy Strasberg and Bob Thomson as well as Allen Barra’s March 22 story in The Wall Street Journal.
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In the days before pre-programmed music blasting from the rafters, major league ballparks employed people to play the organ to entertain the fans. Jane Jarvis played the Thomas organ for the Milwaukee Braves and the New York Mets. To be honest, I thought she had passed on years ago. But she’s very much alive and […]
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is available on Amazon.com,
In a former life, I was the sports and features editor for a weekly New Jersey newspaper, where I hosted an award-winning bog about Jews and Sports.
I did a profile piece on the legendary cartoonist Arnold Roth and he was very generous in immortalizing me in this caricature.
My article on Sandy Koufax in the 1965 World Series appears in
My article on the later biographies of Babe Ruth appears in
My article on the Mets’ 1969 postseason appears in
Profiles of several Jewish baseball figures appear in
* W2W4: Upcoming titles
January 1, 2009
Been receiving some publisher’s catalogs recently. Here are a few 2009 titles to look forward to: >> As mentioned previously, Joe Torre and Tom Verducci have collaborated on the manager’s autobio, coming next month from Random House. >> Bloomsbury will release a behind-the-scenes look at the machinations of baseball’s Valhalla in Cooperstown Confidential: Heroes, Rogues, […]
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