Happy Tuesday everyone. Hope all is well in your world.
People often ask me if I had a favorite movie that I enjoyed watching repeatedly as a kid. That answer for me is a no-brainer. I was nine years old when I first watched 'Pride Of The Yankees' starring Gary Cooper and Teresa Wright as Lou and Eleanor Gehrig. To this day I still get all choked up and teary eyed as the speech is accurately quoted by Cooper. Lou Gehrig was an iron man of a baseball player from 1925-1939.
Over 2,130 games played. 493 Home Runs. He may have gotten more had he not batted right behind Babe Ruth for a solid headache. Still the holder of the American League record for RBI's in a season (184 in 1931). Not one game missed for almost 14 years. It was on this day in Detroit that Henry Louis Gehrig went to Joe McCarthy and said, 'I'm taking myself out for the good of the team'. Gehrig would bring out the lineup card as the crowd in Briggs Stadium gave their kudos. The nation would do the same as reports circulated via the radio waves.
Unbeknownst to anyone Lou Gehrig was dying of ALS (Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis). A disease that kills all neuro-muscular abilities while the mind stays unaffected.
Less than two years after Lou was made aware of what was wrong with him, he was dead two weeks short of his 38th birthday. The disease now bears his name.
Playing with everything from headaches, blisters, fever, broken bones, attacks of lumbago, and the occasional beaning, Lou Gehrig never missed a game. A nation mourned at his passing on June 2nd 1941. For all the stories we read about Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig was the athlete I most wanted to emulate while healthy.
One can only wonder what might have been had he not gotten ill so early in his career. That is conjecture for the so-called experts to talk about. 73 years ago today history was made, and recognized in Detroit, Michigan. We said goodbye to the Iron Horse of New York.
He considered himself the luckiest man on the face of the earth. I will always remember him as 'The Pride of The Yankees'.
Over and out in Big D.
Mr. Will