the dog did not bark
Gehrig did not play … my Dad
saw it not happen
Going through the New York Times this morning, I read the article, MLB City Connect: All 29 uniforms ranked, from the so-so to the sublime (click here to read and view the uniforms).
These are Major League Baseball uniforms that are part of Nike’s planned three-year cycle of cityinspired fits.
City Inspired means that the uniform captures the look, the feel, the vibe (in the City of Detroit’s case, Nike chose a pattern of tire tread’s to signify that the city has been run over I guess) of any given Major League city.
Nobody asked me but if somebody asked me, I would say they look like someone asked CHAT GTi to ‘DESIGN THE UGLIEST, DUMBEST most AWFUL Uniforms possible.’
If that WAS the intent, then Nike did a great job.
If that wasn’t the intent, I fail to grasp what they wanted to do.
If, as it is presented at it’s most base level, the goal was to sell more T-Shirts, I am not sure I know anyone who would wear anyone of these new looks.
In contrast I offer this picture.
This is Lou Gehrig.
The Iron Man.
The feller who held the record for 50 years of most consecutive major league baseball game played.
It was Grand Rapids Michigan native and GR Catholic Central grad, Wally Pipp who played 1st base for the Yankee’s who on June 2, 1925, told the manager he wanted to sit out as he had a headache.
The Yankee’s put in Mr. Gehrig who then played the next 2,130 games for Yankee’s at 1st base and Mr. Pipp became the moral of not missing a day at work stories.
Look at the uniform in this picture.
Everything about it is so right as almost everything in those Nike cItyinspired fits gets wrong.
This was the uniform of the New York Yankees.
The team that represented the city of New York.
The team Darth Vador would have played for.
The easy confidence of being number 1 and knowing it drips out of the logo on the cap, the simple black capital letters, and the smile on Mr. Gehrig’s face.
They were on top and their city was on top and they knew it and so did the rest of the world.
I have always loved this photo.
Both for its content AND its construction as a photo.
The grays and the blacks.
The dugout.
The bench.
And the story.
See, this photo is captioned, “New York Yankees first baseman Lou Gehrig watches from the dugout during warmups as his Iron Man streak ends in Detroit, May 2, 1939.”
This is the day when Mr. Gehrig finally gave in to the way he felt and said he couldn’t play.
He didn’t know it, but he had Lou Gehrig’s Disease or Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), also known as motor neurone disease (MND).
That diagnosis wouldn’t be released for another couple weeks, on June 19, 1939.
I remember liking this photo so much, that I took the book it was in, The Glory of Their Times: The Story of the Early Days of Baseball Told by the Men Who Played It by Lawrence S. Ritter, and showed the picture to my Dad.
Dad took the book and studied the photograph.
Then he said, “I was at that game.”
He didn’t say anything else about it but I was impressed and that nugget stayed in my brain.
It clicked that the game must have been in Detroit and that my Dad had made the trip down there from Grand Rapids where he lived and where I grew up, to watch the Tigers play the Yankee’s and was a witness to history of Mr. Gehrig’s last game.
Looking at this picture brought this memory back for me and I wondered about the box score for the game.
I searched, “Lou Gehrig’s last game” and got a bit of a shock.
Lou Gehrig’s last game wasn’t May 2nd.
According to the records, Lou Gehrig’s last game was April, 30th, in New York.
I knew my Dad had not been in New York City in 1939.
Or at least I was pretty sure and if he had been, he never mentioned it.
What was going on here.
Could my Dad have been mistaken?
Could my Dad have made it up?
I have to say it really bothered me that for years I had it in my mind that Dad had been there.
And now it seems, he wasn’t.
I thought about it some more.
I checked Gehrig’s playing record and there it was.
He played his last game, ever, on April 30, 1939.
In Yankee Stadium.
On April 30, 1939, the batting records, the numbers, everything, all stop.
I don’t mind telling you I was pretty blue.
Then it hit me.
I was searching for the wrong day.
The dog DID NOT bark.
On May 2, 1939, in Tiger Stadium, Gehrig DID NOT PLAY.
Gehrig did not play for the 1st time since 1925.
And my Dad, 19 years old in the spring of 1939, was there.
I often think of my Dad.
He was a Dentist and in fact, started Dental School that fall in Ann Arbor, Michigan and I have always wondered if he was in Ann Arbor to register or something when he decided to drive over to the ball game in Detroit.
I can see him sitting the table with the baseball book in his hands, studying this photograph.
The one with the Tiger Stadium stands in the background.
It was probably about 40 years after it happened that Dad was looking at that book with me.
I think that is was about 40 years ago that me and my Dad had this conversation.
My Dad might have been sitting at the table with me but I bet in his mind he was 19 and sitting in Tiger Stadium.
Just another memory of me and my Dad.
Got a lot of them and I feel lucky to have them.
By the way, in that photo is another Yankee ballplayer wearing number 11.
That is the great Lefty Gomez.
You might not remember him, but I bet you remember for what he said,
“I’d rather be … ,” said Lefty, “ … lucky than good.“
No Haiku For You 