Category Archives: Sports

LEARNING TO SWORD FIGHT FROM MEDIEVAL INSTRUCTION BOOKS.

LEARNING TO SWORD FIGHT FROM MEDIEVAL INSTRUCTION BOOKS. The article by Anderson and Smith has lots of photographs and illustrations of what medieval sword fighting must have been like. How do they know? It turns out that there are a … Continue reading

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SWORDS AND ARMOR.

SWORDS AND ARMOR. This article by Matt Anderson and Shane Smith on armored fighting gives a partial explanation of how Robert Morley was killed. In armored fighting, the edge of the sword was unimportant. Rather, armored sword fighting is all … Continue reading

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MEDIEVAL SPORT—TOURNAMENTS.

MEDIEVAL SPORT—TOURNAMENTS. Annalisa called my attention to this article in The Telegraph by Auslam Cramb in June 2009 about recent research on the skeleton of a knight who radio carbon dating suggests was killed in about 1390. Relying on historical … Continue reading

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JEAN SHEPHERD’S LOU GEHRIG STORY.

JEAN SHEPHERD’S LOU GEHRIG STORY. Jean Shepherd, from whose stories the movies A Christmas Story and Ollie Hopnoodle’s Vacation of Bliss were taken, was a White Sox fan, as was his father. Here is Jean Shepherd sitting in old Comiskey … Continue reading

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MOE BERG IN JAPAN.

MOE BERG IN JAPAN. I posted here about how Moe Berg “went to a lecture by Werner Heisenberg in Switzerland during World War II with instructions to kill Heisenberg if the lecture showed that Germany was far along on building … Continue reading

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TOURING JAPAN BEFORE WORLD WAR II.

TOURING JAPAN BEFORE WORLD WAR II. LEFTY tells the story of a 1934 tour of Japan by major league players who included Lefty Gomez, Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig and their wives—and Moe Berg, a backup catcher. This was the sixth … Continue reading

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THE AIRPLANE STORY.

THE AIRPLANE STORY. Lefty Gomez was celebrated for his wit, and there are many stories about him. His nicknames included “Goofy” or “El Goofo”, and sportswriters loved to tell stories about him. One I have been telling since I was … Continue reading

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HELPING A PITCHER BY TAKING OUT HIS TEETH.

HELPING A PITCHER BY TAKING OUT HIS TEETH. I learned from LEFTY that in the 1930’s “yanking teeth was an accepted medical procedure for a ballplayer who ate well but remained skinny.” In 1930 Lefty Gomez was a skinny 21 … Continue reading

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LEFTY.

LEFTY. Mary Jane met Vernona Gomez recently. Vernona Gomez is the daughter of the Hall of Fame pitcher Lefty Gomez; she and Lawrence Goldstone have written a biography of Lefty Gomez: LEFTY. I’ve read it eagerly. The book begins with … Continue reading

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KERRI STRUG.

KERRI STRUG. Before reading about Manteo Mitchell running 200 meters with a broken leg, I had thought that Kerri Strug’s courage could never be matched. This ESPN account by Rick Weinberg has the dramatic flair of Grantland Rice. Kerri Strug … Continue reading

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