Hank Greenberg; The Story of My Life
Chicago: Triumph Books, 2001. First printing thus. Hardcover. xvii, [1], 286 pages. Illustrations. Career Statistics. Index. Hank Greenberg died before he could finish this book. There were gaps in the manuscript that the Editor attempted to fill. Henry Benjamin Greenberg (born Hyman Greenberg; January 1, 1911 – September 4, 1986), nicknamed "Hammerin' Hank", "Hankus Pankus", or "The Hebrew Hammer", was an American professional baseball player and team executive. He played in Major League Baseball (MLB), primarily for the Detroit Tigers as a first baseman in the 1930s and 1940s. A member of the Baseball Hall of Fame and a two-time Most Valuable Player (MVP) Award winner, he was one of the premier power hitters of his generation and is widely considered one of the greatest sluggers in baseball history. He had 47 months of military service including service in World War II, all of which took place during what would have been prime years in his major league career. Greenberg played the first twelve of his 13 major league seasons for Detroit. He was an American League (AL) All-Star for four seasons[a] and an AL MVP in 1935 (first baseman) and 1940 (left fielder). He had a batting average over .300 in eight seasons, and won two World Series championships with the Tigers (1935 and 1945). Greenberg was the first Jewish superstar in American team sports. Having endured his share of anti-semitic abuse in his career, Greenberg was one of the few opposing players to publicly welcome African-American player Jackie Robinson to the major leagues in 1947. This autobiography of Hank Greenberg tells of one of the most dynamic and inspiring stories in the history of baseball. The son of Eastern European parents, he rose from the streets of New York to rank among the greatest home-run hitters of the game, and became the first Jewish player to be elected to the Hall of Fame. Along the way he challenged Babe Ruth's record of 60 home runs in a season; led the Detroit Tigers to four pennants; fiercely stood up to anti-Semitic slurs, insults, and assaults; and was one of the first major leaguers to enlist in the military at the outbreak of World War II. Hank Greenberg's extraordinary life in baseball-playing with and against Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Ted Williams, Charlie Gehringer, Joe DiMaggio, Dizzy Dean, and Bob Feller, combined the uncommon courage, dignity, strength and, to be sure, humor, in the face of formidable odds. Ira Berkow (born January 7, 1940, in Chicago, Illinois) is an American sports reporter, columnist, and writer. He shared the 2001 Pulitzer Prize for National Reporting, which was awarded to the staff of The New York Times for their series How Race Is Lived in America. From 1981 to 2007 he was a sports reporter and columnist for The New York Times[4][5] and has written for Esquire, The New York Times Magazine, Art News, Seventeen, Chicago Magazine, The Chicago Tribune Magazine, National Strategic Forum Review, Reader's Digest, and Sports Illustrated, among others. His work has been reprinted or cited over six decades in the annual anthologies Best Sports Stories and its successor Best American Sports Writing, and a column of his was included in Best American Sports Writing of the Century (1999). The novelist Scott Turow wrote, "Ira Berkow is one of the great American writers, without limitation to the field of sports." Condition: Very good / Very good.
Keywords: Hank Greenberg, Baseball, Detroit Tigers, World Series, All-Star, Dizzy Dean, Bob Feller, Jimmie Foxx, Anti-Semitism, Jackie Robinson, Babe Ruth, Bill Veeck
ISBN: 1892049236
[Book #86061]
Price: $75.00