by David Krell | Mar 14, 2017 | David Krell
In March of 1966, Bobby Hull set an NHL scoring record for a single season, Gemini 8 brought NASA one giant leap closer to a manned moon landing by completing the first docking with another space craft, and Julie Newmar set hearts of males from eight to eighty beating...
by David Krell | Mar 13, 2017 | David Krell
Hollywood’s cup of glamour runneth over with lore, the most significant likely being, in terms of endurance, the story of Lana Turner, she of the tight-fitting sweater, busty figure, and platinum blonde hair. Turner’s genesis as a star began at...
by David Krell | Mar 12, 2017 | David Krell
William Shakespeare, like other innovators, warned of worries that could prevent success—”Our doubts are traitors, and make us lose the good we oft might win, by fearing to attempt,” wrote the Bard in Measure for Measure. It is a certainty, of course, that...
by David Krell | Mar 11, 2017 | David Krell
Until 1953, New Englanders split their major league loyalties between two teams—the Braves and the Red Sox. With a Beantown pedigree predating the National League’s formation in 1876, the former trekked to the land of beer and bratwurst—Milwaukee—while the...
by David Krell | Mar 10, 2017 | David Krell
One was pugnacious. The other, almost regal. When John Joseph McGraw took the field, he embraced baseball games as bouts, thus earning his nicknames Mugsy and Little Napoleon. When Cornelius McGillicuddy managed the Philadelphia Athletics, he wore a suit rather than...
by David Krell | Mar 9, 2017 | David Krell
While Jackie Robinson prepared to break into the major leagues by getting a year of seasoning with the Dodgers’ AAA ball club, the Montreal Royals, Abe Saperstein diversified his minority sports portfolio beyond the Harlem Globetrotters by spearheading the...
by David Krell | Mar 8, 2017 | David Krell
Cleveland’s baseball curriculum vitae has many bright points. Examples include Bob Feller hurling three no-hitters, Larry Doby breaking the color line in the American League, and Quincy Trouppe leading the Buckeyes to a Negro League World Series championship in...
by David Krell | Mar 7, 2017 | David Krell
When Jim Bouton’s book Ball Four hit bookshelves in 1970, it exploded myths, revealed secrets, and offered tales of baseball, theretofore kept protected from the public. If reporters knew about Mickey Mantle’s alcohol problem, for example, they...
by David Krell | Mar 6, 2017 | David Krell
When the New York Mets took the field for the first time, America was awash in a tidal wave of promise. The year was 1962—John Glenn had become the first American to orbit the Earth, First Lady Jacqueline Kennedy had taken viewers on an unprecedented televised tour...
by David Krell | Mar 5, 2017 | David Krell
If Boston ever establishes a Mount Rushmore of sports, the four visages will likely be those of Robert Gordon Orr, Larry Joe Bird, Thomas Edward Patrick Brady, Jr., and Theodore Samuel Williams. Bobby. Larry. Tom. Ted. When Ted Williams swung his bat, a hit was not...
