 "One of a kind treasure" | 2009-10-11 |
| - Reviewed By User: A2DJO6W0GH18RJ |
This is an amazing audio book for even the most casual lover of baseball. The audio book is a compilation of original recorded interviews made in the early 1960's with pro baseball players in the early days of the game. What an opportunity to hear from their own mouths stories of baseball from the men who played with and against Ty Cobb, Babe Ruth, Walter Johnson and many others.
The interviewees include several hall of famers in their own right, including Goose Goslin, Sam Crawford and Rube Marquods. Fabulous; simply fabulous!
What a treat this was to share with my son on a drive up to Cooperstown. |
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| "Baseball's Glorious Past" | 2009-10-02 |
| - Reviewed By User: A3FHSO1SKHU378 |
Lawrence Ritter's captivating look at baseball in the late 19th and early 20th centuries, directly from the players themselves, is a stark contrast to the game the modern players play; which in reality, is more of a business than a game. And like much of corporate America, the game of baseball has evolved into a cold and calculating endeavor, where the fan seems to be enjoying the game less with each passing season.
It didn't use to be that way. Players were largely underpaid employees of the rich and unscrupulous owners, and most of them had to find work in the off season just to make ends meet. These guys had to fight their way through each season, as if their lives depended on it; certainly, their livelihoods were at stake.
The players certainly had a zest for the game which hasn't been seen in modern baseball since the Gashouse Gang---The rough and tumble bunch of ballplayers that comprised the 1934 St Louis Cardinals; they fought hard, they played hard, and their great spirit captured the imagination of fans across the country during the Great Depression. They were simply a throwback to an earlier era---around the turn of the 20th century---when the players played the game with a competitive ferocity, but also had fun doing it.
The tales of the old days are a refreshing look at what the game was like before it became tainted by the almighty dollar; and well before there was any notion of political correctness getting in the way. Can you imagine calling a guy "Three Finger" Brown or "Dummy" Hoy nowadays?
Any fan of the game will cherish this masterpiece; it brings back to life an era of baseball's past that was certainly flawed; yet at the same time, filled with the glory that is baseball in its purest form.
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| "Take Me Out to Old-time Baseball" | 2009-05-08 |
| - Reviewed By User: A2X1S9AYQ7M1L9 |
| This is an enormously engaging book on baseball, when it was still a game and in the process of becoming the national pastime in the early 1900s. Players from that era reminisce about their youth, how they became involved in professional ball and how they played the game. Fascinating stuff for anyone who considers himself a baseball aficionad. |
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| "Oh, How They Played the Game!" | 2009-02-28 |
| - Reviewed By taxdawg |
"The Glory of their Times" is a book of personality, a book of passion, in which 22 baseball players of the 1890s to the 1930s tell their stories. Originally taped by Lawrence Ritter in the 1960s, these oral remembrances are now very valuable. There are no longer any live witnesses of the earlier times. The later times are fast escaping conscious memory, setting aside the contribution of Paul Waner, the only interviewee who played past 1938.
I met Rube Marquard, the first interviewee presented, in 1975, during induction week at the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown. Marquard, who had been inducted four years earlier, had a cane. He told me that New York Giant manager John McGraw was the greatest manager ever, and that Marquard's Giant teammate, pitcher Christy Mathewson, and others of his day played for the love of the sport. "Today, all the players want is money," he said. What would he say about the players of 2009? Giant catcher Chief Meyers also emphasized the love of the sport argument to Ritter: "Most of us would have paid them just to let us play." Regardless of the veracity of these statements, modern players benefit from a huge legacy the old timers bequeathed to them. Ritter states in his preface that they were "men who chased a dream and, at least for a time, caught up with it and lived with it...They were pioneers...They entered an endeavor which lacked social respectability, and when they left it, it was America's National Game."
The years 1905-1914, after baseball's rules became relatively settled, are particularly special for me. With the home run a rare treat, bunting, contact hitting, good baserunning, and stolen bases were the keys. The Chicago Cubs had their "peerless leader," Frank Chance; Three Finger Brown and their other great pitchers; and their Tinker-to-Evers to Chance double play trio. They won the pennant every year from 1906 to 1910 except 1909, when Honus Wagner's Pittsburgh Pirates beat Ty Cobb's Detroit Tigers in the World Series as Wagner vastly outplayed the nasty Cobb. In 1908, Giant Fred Merkle's boner, recounted in detail here by teammate Al Bridwell, forced a playoff between the Giants and Cubs. The Cubs won and beat Cobb's Tigers in the World Series. This was one of the greatest seasons ever, and together with the 1909 season represented a peak in fan interest.
The famous action shot of Cobb sliding into New York Highlander third baseman Jimmy Austin is in this book, and Austin discusses Cobb, spikes and all. Sam Crawford, Cobb's teammate, picks Wagner over Cobb as the best player he ever saw (plus, for what it is worth, Tris Speaker over Willie Mays in centerfielding). Tommy Leach, Wagner's teammate, picks Wagner as "[t]he greatest everything ever."
Rube Bressler tells us about the great pitchers and the "$100,000" infield of the Philadelphia A's. That is $100 million today. Red Sox outfielder Harry Hooper and Smoky Joe Wood himself tell us about the Red Sox fireballer's 1912 season, in which he went 34-5 and won 16 straight games. Wood was the only pitcher of the time who could throw as hard as Walter Johnson, and Wood beat him 1-0 in a regular season game that was one of baseball's biggest draws (Johnson also won 16 straight that year). Wood was almost the loser in the World Series finale, but Fred Snodgrass dropped a fly ball in the 10th inning with the Giants ahead, and they and their beloved Mathewson went down to a heartbreaking defeat. Poor Snodgrass describes how, to no avail, he made a great catch on the next play that only detail-minded baseball fans know about. Hooper tells us he sure did remember, and he also recalls Babe Ruth as a young pitcher.
Bridwell states the best modern players are in the league of the best old timers, but we can still appreciate the humor of Lefty O'Doul. He recounts how he was at a dinner in about 1960 and acknowledged that Willie Mays was a great fielder and quite a good baserunner but could not carry the bat of Babe Ruth, Ty Cobb, and some other old timers. Cobb hit .367 lifetime when the spitball was legal, along with the emery ball and the shine ball. A youngster asked O'Doul what he thought Cobb would hit today. O'Doul replied, "about the same as Mays, maybe .340." The kid asked, "Then why do you say Cobb was so great if he could only hit .340 or so with this lively ball?"
O'Doul replied, "You have to take into consideration, the man is now seventy-three years old."
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| "old time baseball" | 2009-02-09 |
| - Reviewed By User: AAF5E7K82Z2U |
| There is nothing better than hearing directly from the people who are part of history. This is a great collection. |
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| "Essential Reading" | 2009-01-16 |
| - Reviewed By User: ASAM6EGR6JQ08 |
It is difficult to add to the justifiable praise that has been accorded to Lawrence S. Ritter's book "The Glory of Their Times." This remarkable book served as the template for many other baseball writers. It is required reading for any serious student of the game.
What makes this book an important contribution to the field of oral histories is that Ritter persuaded numerous surviving baseball stars from the latter stages of "The Deadball Era" to relate their recollections fifty to sixty years after they had retired as active athletes. In effect, he recorded not only their personal stories for future generations of readers, but he left a record of a distinct period in the history of the sport that was eclipsed by the introduction of the lively baseball in the Twenties and the home run production binges that revolutionized the game immediately afterwards.
Here you have the stories of baseball as it was played during the first twenty years of the Twentieth Century. Most of the ballparks were wooden stadiums without most of the modern amenities. Here you will find the likes of John McGraw, Frank Chance, Tris Speaker, Ty Cobb, Sam Rice, Honus Wagner and Christy Mathewson.
I wish that I could experience the pleasure of rereading this book for the first time again. |
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