Jewish Major Leaguers in Their Own Words
Title | Jewish Major Leaguers in Their Own Words PDF eBook |
Author | Peter Ephross |
Publisher | McFarland |
Pages | 229 |
Release | 2014-01-10 |
Genre | Sports & Recreation |
ISBN | 0786489669 |
Between 1870 and 2010, 165 Jewish Americans played Major League Baseball. This work presents oral histories featuring 23 of them. From Bob Berman, a catcher for the Washington Senators in 1918, to Adam Greenberg, an outfielder for the Chicago Cubs in 2005, the players discuss their careers and consider how their Jewish heritage affected them. Legends like Hank Greenberg and Al Rosen as well as lesser-known players reflect on the issue of whether to play on high holidays, responses to anti-Semitism on and off the field, bonds formed with black teammates also facing prejudice, and personal and Jewish pride in their accomplishments. Together, these oral histories paint a vivid portrait of what it was like to be a Jewish Major Leaguer.
American Jews and America's Game
Title | American Jews and America's Game PDF eBook |
Author | Larry Ruttman |
Publisher | U of Nebraska Press |
Pages | 544 |
Release | 2013-04-01 |
Genre | Sports & Recreation |
ISBN | 0803264755 |
Discusses the history of Jewish participation in America's pastime, including players, team owners, and sportswriters.
The Cooperstown Symposium on Baseball and American Culture, 2017-2018
Title | The Cooperstown Symposium on Baseball and American Culture, 2017-2018 PDF eBook |
Author | William M. Simons |
Publisher | McFarland |
Pages | 229 |
Release | 2019-03-11 |
Genre | Sports & Recreation |
ISBN | 1476636311 |
Widely acknowledged as the preeminent gathering of baseball scholars, the annual Cooperstown Symposium on Baseball and American Culture has made significant contributions to baseball research. This collection of 15 new essays selected from the 2017 and the 2018 symposia examines topics whose importance extend beyond the ballpark. Presented in six parts, the essays explore baseball's cultural and social history and analyze the tools that encourage a more sophisticated understanding of baseball as a game and enterprise.
Matzoh Balls and Baseballs
Title | Matzoh Balls and Baseballs PDF eBook |
Author | Dave Cohen |
Publisher | |
Pages | 177 |
Release | 2010 |
Genre | History |
ISBN | 9780982285343 |
As "America's favorite pastime," perhaps no sport has chronicled the rise of an immigrant nation like baseball. From German-American parents came Babe Ruth, Italian-Americans proudly point to Joe DiMaggio, and Jackie Robinson shattered the color barrier for African Americans that had kept them out of the game since the 1880s. Certainly, almost every Jewish baseball fan knows the names of Hall of Famers Hank Greenberg and Sandy Koufax, but Jews have played professional baseball in the United States since the earliest days of the sport. Indeed, over 160 Jews are known to have played professional baseball during the modern era, contributing significantly to the game on every level. But who, other than Koufax, is the only other Jewish pitcher to win the Cy Young Award? Which Jewish ballplayer's place in baseball history is assured, as he has the distinction of being the first major leaguer to play a game as a DH? In his landmark book Matzoh Balls and Baseballs, popular sportscaster Dave Cohen uncovers this hidden history and goes right to the source for answers, interviewing 17 former Jewish MLB players to hear, in their own words, what it was like to play in the Majors - the triumphs, frustrations, and everything in between. Foreword by Steve Greenberg. Interviewees include: Larry Yellen, Ron Blomberg, Elliott Maddox, Jim Gaudet, Richie Scheinblum, Joe Ginsberg, Ross Baumgarten, Mike Epstein, Ken Holtzman, Norm Sherry, Steve Stone, Steve Hertz, Don Taussig, Norm Miller, Barry Latman, Morris Savransky, and Al Rosen.
The Baseball Talmud
Title | The Baseball Talmud PDF eBook |
Author | Howard Megdal |
Publisher | Triumph Books |
Pages | 227 |
Release | 2022-05-03 |
Genre | Biography & Autobiography |
ISBN | 163727033X |
Updated and expanded edition! From the icons of the game to the players who got their big break but never quite broke through, The Baseball Talmud provides a wonderful historical narration of Major League Jewish Baseball in America. All the stats, the facts, the stories, and the (often unheralded) glory. This delightful compmendium reveals that there is far more to Jewish baseball than Hank Greenberg's powerful slugging and Sandy Koufax's masterful control. From Ausmus to Zinn, Berg to Kinsler, Holtzman to Yeager, and many others, Howard Megdal draws upon the lore and the little-known details that increase our enjoyment of the game. This new, expanded edition of The Baseball Talmud rewrites the history of Jewish baseball and is a book that every baseball fan should own.
The Spy Who Played Baseball
Title | The Spy Who Played Baseball PDF eBook |
Author | Carrie Jones |
Publisher | Kar-Ben Publishing ™ |
Pages | 32 |
Release | 2018-03-01 |
Genre | Juvenile Fiction |
ISBN | 154151713X |
Moe Berg is not a typical baseball player. He's Jewish—very unusual for the major leagues in the 1930s—has a law degree, speaks several languages, and loves traveling the world. He also happens to be a spy for the U.S. government. When World War II begins, Moe trades his baseball career for a life of danger and secrecy. Using his unusual range of skills, he sneaks into enemy territory to gather crucial information that could help defeat the Nazis. But he also has plenty of secrets of his own. . .
Out of Left Field
Title | Out of Left Field PDF eBook |
Author | Rebecca Trachtenberg Alpert |
Publisher | Oxford University Press, USA |
Pages | 0 |
Release | 2016-07 |
Genre | History |
ISBN | 9780190619138 |
"In Out of Left Field, Rebecca Alpert explores how Jewish sports entrepreneurs, political radicals, and a team of black Jews from Belleville, Virginia called the Belleville Grays--the only Jewish team in the history of black baseball--made their mark on the segregated world of the Negro Leagues. Through in-depth research, Alpert tells the stories of the Jewish businessmen who owned and promoted teams as they both acted out and fell victim to pervasive stereotypes of Jews as greedy middlemen and hucksters. Some Jewish owners produced a kind of comedy baseball, akin to basketball's Harlem Globetrotters--indeed, Globetrotters owner Abe Saperstein was very active in black baseball--that reaped financial benefits for both owners and players but also played upon the worst stereotypes of African Americans and prevented these black "showmen" from being taken seriously by the major leagues. But Alpert also shows how Jewish entrepreneurs, motivated in part by the traditional Jewish commitment to social justice, helped grow the business of black baseball in the face of the oppressive Jim Crow restrictions, and how radical journalists writing for the Communist Daily Worker argued passionately for an end to baseball's segregation."--From publisher description.