The Freemans Journal - Cooperstowns Newspaper Since 1808

Thursday, July 16, 2009

By Charlie Vascellaro

At a time when baseball fans feel further from the players than ever, most separated from the field by a moat of lower level seats that can cost as much as $2,500 per game, the prospect of a personal encounter with a favorite ballplayer seems as far removed from the real world as a Hollywood movie.
Whether their scenarios are still realistically plausible today, two fans of this year’s Hall of Fame inductees crossed over into the real-life world of their favorite players becoming poignant parts of each other’s lives.

RICKEY HENDERSON

Regarded by none other than Rickey Henderson himself as his “Number One fan,” Erin States enjoyed more than the proverbial 15 minutes of fame in 1993 when sportswriter Steve Wulf wrote a column in Sports Illustrated about her special relationship with Rickey.
As a 9-year-old, Erin was left heart-broken when Rickey was traded to Toronto, bringing a temporary end to a 4-year love affair that began when she was just 5.
Sitting with her family in Section 130 of the Oakland Coliseum, close to where Rickey was positioned in left field, he immediately became her favorite player.
“It was right after he was traded back to the A’s from the Yankees and the fans were pretty stoked,” recalled Erin. “They were yelling his name, and I loved the fact that he would wave at the fans and I wanted him to wave at me but I was little and he didn’t see me.
“My mom said, ‘We’ll make a sign so he can see you.’ And we did, and even tested it in the backyard to make sure it could be seen from a distance.
I’d go down to the end of the aisle and hold my sign and he would wave to me, and one time he handed me a ball. He instantly became my favorite player, and we obviously developed a friendship.
“We made more signs; ‘GOOD HIT,’ ‘GREAT STEAL,’ ‘NICE HOME RUN,’ …anything,” said Erin.
The fan-player bond became so strong, Rickey even mentioned Erin in his autobiography, “Off Base: Confessions of a Thief,” inscribing her copy, “to my number one fan.”
“She seemed like a real intelligent little girl to me,” recalled Rickey in a recent conference call. “She would make up signs about what was going on in the game. I could tell that she respected what I did on the field.”
Riney said he tried to be friendly to fans everywhere he played, explaining, “To me I think the fans who work 9-5, five days a week, they’re coming for us to entertain them and make their kids happy. I wanted to be able to relate to the fans.”
Upon learning that her friend Rickey had been traded to a team at the opposite end of the continent, Erin wrote a letter to Bay area newspapers asking: “If someone out there knows Rickey, would you please tell him that the girl with the signs in the left-field corner of the Oakland Coliseum misses him very much. And would you tell him I say goodbye; I didn’t even get to say goodbye.”
The letter somehow found its way to Rickey in Toronto, who reportedly cried when he read it: “The fans and the press might be on me, but I knew I could always count on that little girl,” Sports Illustrated reported him saying.
The first time Henderson returned to Oakland as a visiting Blue Jays about a month later he made his way back to his old regular spot in the left field corner and found Erin.
Rickey hugged and kissed his favorite little fan and newspaper photographers captured their tearful embrace, the picture also later ran in the Sports Illustrated story.
“I remember being really nervous and shaky. He warmed up for quite a bit before he finally made his way over to me,” Erin said.
“I was really excited to see him, but when he finally came over I was really sad that he was with another team. I didn’t understand trades, all I knew was that my friend was playing for a different team that was far away.”
The two enjoyed enough time together before the game to be noticed by everyone around them, including newspaper photographers. Overnight, Erin became the feel-good story of the day.
“I remember the picture being picked up and sent out on the A-P wire. A friend of ours called to tell us it was in the San Francisco Chronicle. So my mom and I raced to the nearest newsstand and bought the paper.
“We ripped open the sports section and looked all over for it. We couldn’t find the picture anywhere. We must have looked three or four times.
“Finally, we put the paper down and saw that the picture was on the front page,” she said.
Soon, ESPN called and Erin was flown to Burbank as a guest on the Roy Firestone talk show.
“The whole experience – being in the newspaper, on the news, Sports Illustrated, ESPN, all of it – was amazing and overwhelming. I mean, I was 9, for Pete’s Sake!”
At the conclusion of the season Rickey re-signed with Oakland (his third of a four stints with the A’s) and resumed his left-field friendship with Erin, more photo ops ensued.
“He always made time for me. When his autobiography came out, my mom was reading it and she started screaming, ‘you’re in the book!’ It was just a couple of sentences that mentioned this little girl that comes to the game holding signs. Only now do I realize how amazing it is,” she said.
Erin’s parents enjoyed the friendship as much as she did.
“With each act of kindness from Rickey, we thought it would end there.  But it didn’t,” said mom Cheryl States. “We finally figured out that something special was happening between the two of them when Rickey wrote of how he felt about Erin in his autobiography.”
Rickey left town again after the 1995 season, but this time it was to San Diego, much closer to Erin’s home, and the family would occasionally make trips to see him.
Of course, Erin was invited to join Rickey on the field before games and collect more pictures of them together for her scrapbook.
In 1997 Rickey signed with the Anaheim Angels and returned to Oakland again in 1998. For the remainder of his career, he continued crisscrossing the country, changing teams five more times between 1999 and 2003.
“After he stopped playing we saw him a few times, once was at the Opening of Petco Park in San Diego. We have a friend who works in the organization and she led us down to the seats where he was sitting we got to talk to him for an hour and it was great,” said Erin, now married with a 2-year-old son.
Nonetheless, she she and her family, including her parents, will be making the trip to Cooperstown for Henderson’s induction ceremony.
“We’re going to try and surprise him; I don’t think he knows we’re actually going. I sent him a card and left him a message on his voice mail,” said Erin.
Her mom is still amazed by it all: “Never in our wildest imagination did we think the efforts of a little 5-year-old girl could mushroom into something so incredibly special and fantastic.  And culminate in a trip to Cooperstown.
“I think Rickey appreciated the fact Erin wasn’t trying to ‘get something’ from him, she just loved him and loved to watch him play baseball. I remember one year, Opening Day, the press had a hey-day with Rickey’s contract negotiations and the fans had been giving him a hard time too. 
“So on this particular Opening Day, Rickey didn’t know what to expect from the fans as he made his way out to his left field position. 
“Of course, some of the fans were jeering him, but as he looked for his friend, Erin, in the stands, she was there holding up a sign for him –‘You’re The Best.’
“You could see a look of relief on his face as he waved and blew a kiss to her.  At least she was in his corner,” recalled Cheryl.
“We too fought back tears during their reunion in Oakland as she sobbed in Rickey’s arms and tried to express how much she missed him I was at her home during the Hall of Fame balloting as she anxiously followed the voting online and awaited the results, only to shed tears again for her friend, the newest inductee to the Hall of Fame.” 

JIM RICE

While Rickey Henderson’s sometimes eccentric but basically cheery persona made him a fan’s player, the line on his 2009 Hall of Fame classmate Jim Rice has been as decidedly different as their elections to the Hall as respective first and last ballot inductees.
As the years kept passing and Rice kept failing to gain election, his supporters often assumed it must have something to do with his personal relationship with the voting baseball writers, believing his accomplishments as a player certainly merited his inclusion.
“You know the reputation: standoffish, surly, not a vocal leader,” said Kevin Crimmins, a life-long Red Sox fan and season-ticker holder who worked as a mailer at the Boston Herald, adding, “That is all true, but it could also be a product of the environment. Busing and racial politics were huge in Boston from 1973 to 1976.
“If I were a young black ballplayer from the South I would have kept my mouth shut, too.”
Making his debut in 1974, Rice joined a team that also included Red Sox legend Carl Yastrzemski, the future Hall of Famer, whom he would eventually follow in left field.
Another, teammate and fellow outfielder Fred Lynn, would edge Rice in Rookie of the Year balloting in 1975; so despite his ability, Rice was not always Fenway’s favorite son.
“Rice never had that legion of fans; he might have been a little under-appreciated. I’d say he was just always admired. One (Lynn) was embraced and the other (Rice) was admired,” says Crimmins.
During his 16-year career with Boston, Rice hit 382 home runs, 1,451 RBI and 2,452 hits, and he batted .298.
His tremendous 1978 season remains one for the books: He led the American League in seven offensive categories, including 46 home runs and 139 RBI.
His 406 total bases made him the first to reach 400 since Hank Aaron in 1959 and were the most since Stan Musial’s 429 in 1948. The last American Leaguer to turn the trick was Joe DiMaggio in 1936.
What Rice’s numbers and reputation don’t reveal are the essential elements of his character. The box score for the Aug. 7, 1982, home game against the White Sox shows Rice going 1 for 4 with a double and two RBI in a 7-3 loss that day.
But the statistical account of the game does not report the best play that Rice made that day, perhaps the greatest of his career.
In the bottom of the fourth inning, Red Sox shortstop Dave Stapleton ripped a hard-line-drive foul ball down the first base line on the left side of the home team’s dugout.
The ball struck 4-year-old Jonathan Keane just above the temple on the left side of his head, fracturing his skull. Keane was sitting with his father and 2-year-old brother in the seats usually reserved for the wife of Red Sox manager Ralph Houk in the second row of Box 29.
“All of a sudden I heard a ‘crack’,” said the boy’s dad, Tom, “and I thought it hit the side of the dugout, because the dugout was right beside us. The ball was just hit so hard you never even saw it.
“I turned around and looked and John was slouched over and blood was gushing out of his head.”
While shocked observers were slow to react, Rice leapt from the dugout, rushed to the seats and scooped little Johnny Keane up in his arms.
“You don’t have time to think about it. You just think about doing something,” Rice said in the next day’s newspaper accounts of the game.
Rice ran back through the dugout and tunnel to the clubhouse, where Red Sox team doctor Arthur Pappas administered treatment before an ambulance arrived to transport Jonathan to nearby Children’s Hospital.
“I remember watching the faces of fans that were more in a panic mode, and his dad also panicking. I was in the dugout and I was on the first step and I saw blood,“ said Rice in a recent conference call.
“My kids could have been in the same situation. I would want someone to feel free to help my kid.”
Boston Herald photographer Ted Gartland captured the moment.
“I’ve hit home runs. I’ve driven in runs. But as far as something that stands out, it’s probably the picture when I went up into the stands and took the kid out of the stands who was hit by a foul ball,” said Rice.
The image remains dramatically vivid all these years later.
It was a long time ago, and while Keane and Rice’s lives have moved in different directions they are forever connected by the incident and a photo that still evokes emotion and reveals something behind the Rice’s public persona.
With Rice’s election to the Hall 27 years later, Jonathan has been receiving a handful of such calls.
“I think the biggest thing for me is looking at Jim Rice: Not only was he great ballplayer but a tremendous person for doing that thing. There were 33,000 people in the ballpark and he’s the one that came out of the dugout and saved my life, it speaks volumes for his character,” said Jonathan, who lives in Raleigh, N.C., and works in the marketing department of canvasondemand.com, which produces top quality prints of family photos.
Being only 4 and getting knocked out by the blow, Jonathan doesn’t remember anything about the incident, except for how the story has been relayed to him by his father.
“It’s hard to believe that was me it hit an inch from my temple,” he said. “If it hit my temple I probably would have died instantaneously. It was one of those line-drive foul balls that go into the stands and are very scary every time they happen.”
The game was NBC television’s “Game of the Week,” so the story received a lot attention.
“I was in critical condition and stayed in the hospital for five days. Hank Aaaron called my mom to see how I was doing. I received lots of mail from fans.
“It took more than a year for me to get back to normal. I threw out the first pitch on the next Opening Day with Carl Yazstremski’s dad,” Jonathan said.
Aside from their Opening Day reunion, Jonathan has had only occasional contact with Rice since.
“I wrote him a letter after college letting him know where I was and the everything was going well and how thankful I was for what he did and that my life was just a big blessing,” he said.
Rice’s action has forever altered Tom Keane’s perception of what can easily be described as the most horrifying day of Jonathan’s father’s life.
“The most positive thing that came out of that situation was the fact that Jonathan has survived it without any permanent damage and is doing great.
“I also think that the incident has allowed the human side of Jim Rice to be exposed and to see what a compassionate and caring person he is as opposed to just seeing him as a professional ball player.
“All of my children have learned a valuable life lesson from the actions of Jim Rice,” Tom Keane concluded.

Labels: 07-24-09, Front Page

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It Was Girls Against The Boys

By LAURA COX

HARTWICK SEMINARY

‘There’s no crying in baseball” means girls can’t cry, but they can play.
For one week a summer for the past six at Cooperstown, and this one is no exception, the sideline is filled with fans in pink and the dugout filled with girls at the Cooperstown Dreams Park.
The WBL Sparks this year played from Friday, July 17, to Thursday, July 23, at the Hartwick Seminary youth-tournament park, playing seven games against, you know, boys.
Coming from Little Leagues in the U.S. and Canada – and this year, one from Hong Kong and one from Australia – the girls had never met each other, never practiced as a team. Many of them were All Stars in leagues where they were the only girls.
Spark’s Coach and Founder Justine Siegal got the idea of an all-girls team when she was 13, playing for a coach who didn’t think she should be on the boys’ field.
She is well known in the baseball world as the first female professional baseball coach – for the Brockton (Mass.) Rox – and the only female collegiate baseball coach, an assistant at Springfield College, where she’s working on her Ph.D. Coaching internationally as well, she will take a team to the World Children’s Baseball Fair next week in Tokyo.
“This week is a chance … to meet other girls who love baseball,” said Siegal after the girls’ first game on Sunday, July 19, against the Dublin (Ohio) Green Sox.
The girls lost, 14-0, but Siegal had encouraging words: “This was our first game; the girls are still stiff, but each game will get better and the girls will get more comfortable on the field. “
The girls played six more games over the course of the week, ending with an early game on Wednesday morning, which eliminated them from the tournament. They went 1-6 for the whole week, but the week was not a loss.
“There were a lot of good individual performances, defensive plays and great hits. I think the girls really enjoyed the camp and playing on a team with other girls who play baseball in a place like Dreams Park is tremendous,” said the WBL Sparks other coach, John Kovach.
Coach Kovach said three players hit home runs during the week: Kyra Laumbach from New Mexico, Katie Burt from Massachusetts, who hit a “monster shot” over left field, and Vera Lau Hei Ting, from Hong Kong.

Labels: 07-24-09, Front Page

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Is Hudson River Painter’s Landscape Of Brookwood Or Nearby Annsfield?

Mrs. Hamilton, Jermain Descendant, Questions Art Dealer’s Conclusion

By JIM KEVLIN

COOPERSTOWN

Mrs. Lewis B. Hamilton believes the Hudson River School painting traced to Brookwood by an Albany art dealer doesn’t depict that estate on Otsego Lake at all.
To her, it looks more like Annsfield, a related property a few hundred yards to the north.
And she believes she ought to know: She’s related by marriage to James Barclay Jermain, the Albany lawyer and philanthropist who bought the properties -- then one piece -- in 1880.
Her daughter by her previous marriage to Lyman Townsend Sr., Lucy Townsend, is Jermain’s great-great-great granddaughter.
Robert T. McLean of McLean Gallery, Albany, had dropped by recently to show her a photo of the painting he credits to George Wellington Waters, a notable 19th century painter.
“I looked at it,” said Mrs. Hamilton the other day, walking across the Annsfield lawn toward Glimmerglass, “and I took a double-take: This isn’t Brookwood; this is Annsfield.”
Standing back from both properties and looking toward the lake, the topography is similar. Both properties have driveways in the foreground and streams to the right.
There are two buildings in the painting.
At Brookwood, the one on the left could be the 1830 home and the one on the right stables demolished two years ago.
At Annsfield, the left one could be a barn demolished last year; the right one the stucco house building in the early 1900s, too late to be depicted if Waters did the painting in 1888.
McLean remains partial to Brookwood, particularly on comparing the painting to an earlier photo of the property in the NYSHA archives.
The scene depicted may be simply a point of curiosity to the general public, but an authoritative link would increase the value of the painting, which is now up for sale. Mrs. Hamilton said the asking price is $65,000.

Labels: 07-24-09, Front Page

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Otsego 2000 Draws Line On Natural-Gas Drilling

Letter Urges DEC: All Water Supplies Deserve Protection

By JIM KEVLIN

COOPERSTOWN

In its 28-year history, Otsego 2000 has succeeded in:
• Shifting the Marcy South high-tension line out of eye-shot of James Fenimore Cooper’s Glimmerglass.
• Halting a huge boat launch planned for Glimmerglass State Park.
• Creating of the Glimmerglass National Historic District, the largest entity of its kind in the nation.
• Toppling multi-national Madrid-based Iberdrola energy company’s plans for 70-plus 400-foot-tall wind turbines within the lake’s viewshed.
Natural-gas drillers, look out.
In recent days, the Otsego 2000 board of directors has sent the state Department of Environmental Conservation a letter and statement that, yes, oppose natural-gas drilling around Glimmerglass and its tributaries.
“The proposed DEC regulations are more a patchwork of local political concessions than a serious effort to address the unique topography and hydrological characteristics of New York State,” the statement reads in part.
More significant to future challenges, it argues the DEC is in the process of putting special protections for New York City’s Catskills’ reservoirs, but not to water supplies serving Upstate communities.
“That’s very troubling to me,” said Otsego 2000 Vice President Nicole Dillingham, an attorney. “If you have a one-mile buffer zone around New York City’s watershed, how do you justify a different treatment of other water supplies?”
She continued: “Why isn’t the rest of New York State entitled to that?” Otsego 2000’s mission statement focuses on Glimmerglass, “but we would certainly support all other communities demanding similar treatment under the law.”
Specifically, Otsego 2000 is providing inputs to DEC on the development of a GEIS (generic environmental impact statement) that would govern a process calling hydro-fracking, which Dillingham called “an attempt to explode the earth from the inside out.”
Where a vertical well is a single shaft, hydro-fracking allows a dozen horizontal shafts to fan out, spider like, from the bottom of a single vertical shaft.
Millions of gallons water and unspecified chemicals are then pumped underground to break up the Marcellus shale that underlies the county, freeing the gas to come to the surface.
Fears are the process with cause contamination of aquifers, wells, streams and lakes communities and individuals depend on for water supplies.
The letter and statement, over signatures of Otsego 2000 President Henry S.F. Cooper, Jr., and Robin Krawitz, executive director, call for:
• a moratorium on hydro-fracking in the Otsego Lake watershed and Otsego County.
• a one-mile buffer zone around Otsego Lake and all its tributaries.
• “site specific environmental review” of any drilling in the watershed. (The GEIS would allow general rules to be applied.)

Labels: 07-24-09, Front Page

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WEEKEND’S BEST BETS

An Alternative To Baseball? Try Museums

If you’re looking for a break from baseball this weekend, stop by The Fenimore Art Museum, just a half mile up Route 80 (West Lake Road.)
In addition to Otsego County favorites – Gilbert Stuart’s portrait of William Cooper, for instance – take in “America’s Rome,” an exhibit of works of Hudson River School painters from the Eternal City.
Also, Walker Evans’ photos are on exhibit.

PRIDE PARADE: The Richfield Springs Pride Parade steps off at 5 p.m. Saturday, July 25, a centerpiece of a two-day festival in that village’s Spring Park. Another highlight: A Richfield Springs “Idol” Talent Contest at 3 p.m. Sunday.

ANOTHER GETAWAY: Another alternative to the Cooperstown hubub: Visit Hyde Hall, a neo-classical mansion – a National Historic Landmark – up East Lake Road.

FREE MOVIE: At 8:30 p.m. Friday, July 24, visit Glimmerglass State Park for a free lake-side showing of “Bedtime Stories.” Get there early for a dip.

CHURCHYARD MUSIC: Stroll through the campus and sanctuary of Christ Episcopal Church at noon Saturday, July 25, while listening to some wonderful music.

PUPPET SHOW: The Colonists present a unique family show at 7 p.m. on Friday, July 24, at the Foothills Performing Arts Center. See the stories of an earthworm who dreams of flying, a rabbit with a penchant for pie making and the mechanics of the pollen collecting-industrial complex.

LOCAL HOP HISTORY: 1-3 p.m. Sunday July 26 visit the Swart-Wilcox House for a lecture on hops by local historian Al Bullard. See some hop tools from Al’s collection and hops growing at the Swart-Wilcox House, Oneonta.

Labels: 07-24-09, Glimmerglass

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‘Top-Of-List Singing,’ ‘Unabashed Slapstick’ Opens Glimmerglass

Verdi’s Opera Classic Transcends The Centuries

ROBERT MOYNIHAN

‘LA TRAVIATA’

If you have to pawn the silver or sell a family antique to attend this production, do so – and throw in a few other baubles from the estate. If you don’t have an estate, give up cigarettes and drinking for a month – then buy a ticket for a Glimmerglass Opera performance of Verdi’s “La Traviata.”
You have heard it before? Not like this production – with superb direction, top-of-the-list singing, exquisite sets, and a libretto that is plausible – about credible emotions tied to the human condition of love and denial, compassion and misunderstanding.
In his middle years, Verdi obviously poured heart and soul into this work.
Amazingly, until his collaborations with Arrigo Boito, the texts used for most of Verdi’s operas are stilted and highly improbable – the usual gypsy-demons, mistaken identities and lost royalty given to falling for the wrong princesses – or maybe, after two hours, the right ones.
At times, even elephants parade on stages large and sturdy enough to support them – and of course, to carry the heavy singers doing the melodic lifting. Those are the absurd occasions for most of Verdi’s musical scores.
The plot of Traviata, however, is plausible – even after these many years – and concerns the conflict of the “upper order” of society, its mating habits, and a young man who strays into the “lower” social level.
Father interferes for the sake of the “family name.” The lovers separate, suffer remorse, and the courtesan-heroine eventually dies in her suitor’s arms.
A pat melodrama, perhaps, but sketched to such effect, and with such moving economy, that the expected devices of operatic platitude are far removed.
The Glimmerglass production, because of its combination of talents at all levels, made an evening at the opera much, much more than mere entertainment. It rose, rather, to a height rarely encountered in any artistic medium.
What made the performance so memorable? Most productions of drama and its relatives in musical form rush through language and scenes as though timed by stopwatch. Not in this production – the director Jonathan Miller recognized the realistic dements of the plot and emphasized them with adequate space and timing.
The conductor Michall Agrest also gave the score that most valuable of emotional talismans – musical rests, pauses for the narration of plot and telling emotion. Agrest knows how to shape orchestral playing so that it breathes with the soloists, with melodic lines following the expressive rise and fall of the human voice.
This ability may not be unique, but is so rare in musical performance that memories of this one evening should remain – one trusts – for the lifetimes of alert listeners.
As for the singing? Well, uniform excellence was a starting point – including the eight young artists in the cast.
As for the principals? The three major roles are often cast with varying ability. A few years ago, I heard a performance at the Vienna Opera with the soprano singing sharp, the bass flat and the tenor compromising somewhere between two extremes. None of these problems occurred in the Cooperstown performance.
The principals in the Glimmerglass production were all superlative. Malcolm MacKenzie carried the palm as the dark, interfering paternal manipulator; the tenor Ryan MacPherson was the eloquent, frustrated suitor.
Rising above even these superlatives, however, was the soprano Mary Dunleavy, who possesses rarities of multiple ability: intelligence, dramatic cunning, and splendid, unerring vocal projection of the extremes of delight and despair.
The score of Traviata may indeed be unfair to the other leading singers, for the doomed Violetta, though finally suffering a fatal end, carries the most telling and virtuosic of the score’s arias. Violetta, but for moments of the score, is the focus of the musical drama. Dunleavy shaped each phrase, dramatically and musically, with exquisite projection and timing.
To rephrase the title of a popular holiday movie – this production is indeed a “Glimmerglass Miracle on Route 80.” Pawn the silver, forego tobacco and gin, or sell great-aunt Gerty’s antique reticule and lorgnette. But see this opera.

‘Mesmerizing Music’ Casts Spell In ‘Cinderella’

SAM GOODYEAR

‘LA CENERENTOLA’

The various tellings of Cinderella all include some form of magic or wizardry or the grotesque. Who will ever forget, if you are old enough to remember, the fairy godmother’s “Bippity Boppity Boo!” in the Walt Disney animated film?
Some versions go so far as to plot murder, and there is one account that has the stepsisters cutting off portions of their feet in order to fit into the glass slipper. Charming.
The magic and wizardry of Glimmerglass Opera’s production of Gioachino Rossini’s “La Cenerentola” comes initially from the pen of the composer himself.
The music is mesmerizing and enthralling and casts a spell, starting with an extended overture full of dramatic tension and expectation.
The curtain rises on Depression-era dilapidation in the home of Don Magnifico, whose escapes from reality include wild dreams, bathtub gin and the fatuous hope that one of his two coarse, vain and ill-mannered daughters will win the amorous attention of Prince Ramiro, on the prowl for a wife, but disguised as his valet Dandini, the latter posing as his master.
The fairy godmother in this version is a Clark Kent sort of tutor to the prince, working his wiles behind the scenes to transform Angelina, known as Cenerentola (Italian for Cinderella), into a stunning beauty.
This inspired production, directed by Kevin Newbury, is not Walt Disney. It is, rather, exaltingly vintage Tom and Jerry. The slapstick is unabashed, the gags obvious and gratifying, the humor altogether in-your-face and wildly successful.
Eduardo Chama, an Argentine singer with enormous comic gifts, provides the right mix of ham and style as Don Magnifico.
John Tessier falls compellingly under the spell of Angelina in their first encounter and in so doing reminds us that, for all the high jinks and hilarity, this is a serious story about the arduous quest for love.
Quebecoise Julie Boulianne, pure innocence and modesty, emerges from the soot and shadows, literally and musically, to win the hearts of prince and spectator alike. In all cases the singing is superb.
In fact, from first note to last, the musicianship is exquisite on all fronts: soloists, chorus, and orchestra, all under the precise and robust conducting of Joseph Colaneri.
Rossini’s penchant for polysyllabic lightning-speed (Tom chasing Jerry and vice versa) ensemble pieces is on full display and the numbers are perfectly delivered, making the patter songs of Gilbert and Sullivan seem no more than peaceful, languorous lullabies in comparison. The bel canto effects are thrilling in both the danger they pose and the excellence of the execution here.
We are never happier than when we are weeping, and we confess to at least three occasions when the only possible response to the masterpiece on the stage was tears of wonder, pleasure, and happiness.
You’re in for a huge treat.

Labels: 07-24-09, Glimmerglass, Glimmerglass Opera

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Come To Main Street For The Art, Stay For The Music

By LAURA COX

As Muddy Waters had it, “The blues had a baby and they named the baby rock ’n’ roll.”
Reservoir Road – the band will play at the City of the Hills Art Festival, beginning at 10 a.m. Saturday, Aug. 1, on Oneonta’s Main Street – went backwards, from rock to the blues, (although you’re likely to hear “Gloria” and “Mustang Sally,” too.)
“We matured back to the roots,” is how lead guitarist Bill Stoneley put it.
For de facto band leader Tom Rowe – the guitar player lives on Reservoir Road in Oneonta and has a music studio there – his love for the blues came as the result of his love of early rock and roll.
“When you look at the roots of rock and roll,” he said the other evening, “you find the blues. Janis Joplin and Billy Holiday were labeled Rock and Roll, but really they were singing blues; the Stones were playing Muddy Waters; the British Invasion and the Beatles electrified the Blues. “
Reservoir Road, founded in 2006, has evolved.
Rowe and Stoneley, both Oneontans, are the only remaining members of the original band. They picked up harmonica player Charlie Reiman of Cooperstown, in 2007. Bassist Doug Howard, Otego, and drummer David Geasey, Oneonta, joined this past January.
Several were fulltime professional musicians, but none is anymore.
Howard runs a music licensing business. Rowe is a contractor. Reiman runs a home-inspection business.
-----Geasey is SUNY Oneonta director of creative media services. Stoneley is a retired welder/mechanic.
They rehearse twice a week above Rowe’s workshop.
In the past, though, Stoneley played with The Inferiors, opening for the Isley Brothers, where he met Jimmie Hendrix before Jimmie hit it big.
Howard has played bass professionally since his teen-age years with such bands as Touch and Stun Leer; he put out a solo album in 2000.
Geasey has played with bands of every type – country, jazz, swing, show tunes, concert bands and orchestras, even a few square dances.
Reiman and Rowe have been playing the blues on their own for years.
In addition to Muddy Waters, Reservoir Road artists draw inspiration from Robert Johnson and Jimmy Rogers.
There are a lot of misconceptions about the blues, the musicians said. Many believe blues tunes are just about the sad things, but that’s not so.
“Some blues are slow, some are up-tempo; the songs are about life, a lot are about bad things, but a lot are about good too,” Stoneley.
“Blues can bring you up out of a funk,” said Reiman.
The band plays “Chicago Blues” mostly.
“We play covers, but we are not a ‘cover band,’” said Rowe. “We play the music our way.”
“To copy Clapton lick for lick would be a waste of time,” said Howard, “you have to make the songs your own, or it’s not genuine.”
The band is working on some originals, but they are not in it to sell CDs, but because they love the music, they love the way it energizes a crowd, and they love the energy the crowd feeds back to them.
“It’s fun music, there is always someone out there with their foot tapping to the music, people enjoy it and dance to it,” said Geasey.
“It’s the look on people’s faces – their smiles – that let you know you’ve done your job,” said Howard.
Most of Reservoir Road’s repertoire is less known than “Mustang Sally,” but sure to get the crowds dancing.
They don’t take requests beyond what’s on their blues song list, not because they don’t know the songs, but because they don’t want to play them. They are not a YMCA playing band or your typical oom-pa wedding band, but they get in a grove and know how to please a crowd.
“There is no ‘typical’ show, everyone is different,” said Rowe. “One night we might play on the Blues Train in Milford and have it packed with 180 people, and the next night less than 100. It really depends on the venue and the audience.”
The band tries to book two shows a month, sometimes three, with at least one in Oneonta and one outside, to vary venues and audiences. They have frequented Autumn Café and The Black Oak Tavern and used to play at the Sego Café.
They are excited to play the City of the Hills Arts Festival, as it will be the first daylight show – a nice change from the dark corners of clubs and bars – and a different audience, one more family oriented.
They hope that the crowd – perhaps as many as 5,000 people – will come for the art, but stop for the music.

Labels: 07-24-09, Glimmerglass

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Obituaries

Marie H. Mauro, 73; Staten Island Native Ran Local Business

COOPERSTOWN – Marie H. Mauro, a woman who will be remembered for leading a full and active life devoted to her family, died Saturday afternoon, July 18, 2009, at Strong Memorial Hospital, Rochester. She was 73.
Born Sept. 20, 1935, in Mariners Harbor, Staten Island, she was a daughter of Louis and Estelle (Gurkowski) Piscopo. Raised and educated on Staten Island, she was a graduate of Port Richmond High School.
On Oct. 5, 1957, she married Dominic G. Mauro at St. Michael’s Roman Catholic Church on Staten Island.
In 1974-76, she was an administrative assistant in the New York City Office of Marine & Aviation in Staten Island’s St. George section, and in the Richmond County public administrator’s office in 1976-82.
Marie was a member of the Women’s Democratic Club and an auxiliary police officer out of the 120th Precinct in St. George.
In April 1983, Marie and Dom moved to the Cooperstown area, where they opened Video Post, a video rental store, first in Milford, then on Oneida Street, Oneonta, with a branch in Cooperstown. They closed their business in 1990 and retired.
Following her husband’s death in 1996, Marie moved back to Staten Island and worked as an administrative assistant at a Pathmark store in Brooklyn.
In 2001, she returned Upstate and worked with the Resource Center for Independent Living, Utica, for three years. She was also a caregiver for her granddaughter, Rachael.
Throughout her well-lived life, Marie was always devoted to her family. A wonderful mother and grandmother, she absolutely loved being with her grandchildren.
She also enjoyed spending time at her computer (especially playing games), mowing her lawn and traveling, and she was a diehard Yankee fan.
During her years locally, Marie was a faithful communicant of St. Mary’s “Our Lady of the Lake” Roman Catholic Church. As a eucharistic minister, she often brought the host to the sick at Bassett Hospital, where she was also a hospital volunteer.
Marie joined Susquehanna Valley Senior Citizens, serving as bellringer.
Survivors include two daughters and sons-in-law, Laura and Steven Buck, and Rosemarie and Richard Abbate, all of Cooperstown; five grandchildren, Ashley Lauren, Rachael Elizabeth and Dominic Robert Buck, and Richard Christopher and Dominick Joseph Abbate; one sister, Louise Valentine and her husband, George, of New Jersey; two brothers, Charles Piscopo and his wife, Josephine, of Staten Island, and Arpaniel Louis Piscopo and his wife, Irene, of New Jersey; three sisters-in-law, Anne Piscopo of Cooperstown, Rosemarie Ganci and her husband, Jerry, of Staten Island, and Barbara Mauro of Staten Island; one brother-in-law, Vincent Martori of Staten Island; and many nieces and nephews.
She was predeceased by her husband of 38 years, who died July 20, 1996; two sisters, Estelle Dunn and Dolores Martori; one brother, James Joseph Piscopo, Sr., who died April 20, 1992; and one nephew, John Richard Piscopo, who died Jan. 20, 2009.
A Mass of Christian Burial was celebrated Wednesday, July 22, with Father John P. Rosson, pastor, officiating. The Rite of Baptism was also celebrated for the benefit of Rachael Elizabeth Buck, Marie’s beloved granddaughter.
Interment followed at St. Mary’s Cemetery, Index.
Marie’s family suggests memorial contributions be made to Pathfinder Village Foundation, 3 Chenango Road, Edmeston, NY 13335-2314.
Arrangements were with Connell, Dow & Deysenroth Funeral Home, Cooperstown.

Robert C. Fritts, 84; Carpenter, Former Marine

COOPERSTOWN – Robert C. Fritts, a beloved resident of Otsego Manor and a Marine Corps veteran, died Monday morning, July 20, 2009, at Otsego Manor. He was 84.
One of 13 children, Bob was born in Morris on Dec. 14, 1924, a son of Leon Byard Fritts and Hazel M. (Tilley) Fritts.
After attending school in Morris, Bob enlisted in the Marines on Jan. 7, 1942, and was based in the British Isles for 28 months during World War II. He was honorably discharged on Jan. 14, 1946.
While he didn’t see actual combat, he recalled a skirmish with the Irish Republican Army on guard at an ammunition dump in Northern Ireland.
Returning home, Bob married the former Evelyn H. Barnum on April 5, 1946, in Cooperstown. They soon moved to Pennsylvania. Bob worked for U.S. Steel, then did heavy construction work as a member of Carpenters Union Local 1462, Philadelphia. For most of his career he was a construction foreman.
In 1979, Bob and his family moved back Upstate, where he continued in carpentry. In 1982, he joined the state Department of Environmental Conservation in Albany as a hazardous waste supervisor, retiring in 1988.
Since, Bob lived in various places throughout the country, and especially enjoyed Florida. He had lived in Otsego Manor since 2005.
Survivors include three daughters, Kathleen Makofske and her husband Rob of Milford, Cynthia Hasty and her husband Robert of Bristol, Pa., and Peggy Sue Minnich and Billy Adams of Arcadia, Fla.; daughter-in-law Betsy Fritts of Carlsbad, Calif.; 10 grandchildren, Bobby, Becky, Cory, Heather, Jackie, Jacob, Ryan, Alicia, Lauryn and Abbie; four great-grandchildren, Robert, Robyn, Jeremy and Autumn; one brother, Allen Fritts of Otego; one sister, Mrs. Joyce Link of Dansville; four sisters-in-law, Mrs. Ruth B. Fritts of Cooperstown, Mrs. Darryl Fritts of Herkimer, Mrs. Marion Fritts of Otsego Manor, and Mrs. Sylvia B. Fritts of Toddsville, and many nieces and nephews.
He was predeceased by his wife, Evelyn, who died Jan. 30, 1988; daughter LeeAnn, who died at age 3 on March 18, 1956; son Robert W. Fritts, who died in November 2006; two sisters, Clemma Elida Turner and Clara Louise Fritts; and eight brothers, Leon (“Roy”) Byard Fritts, Jr., Frederick Earl Fritts, James Edward Fritts, Ralph Donald Fritts, Carl B. Fritts, Irvin Lee Fritts, Gerald Fritts, and Charles Frank Fritts.
Military honors and placement in the columbarium will be private at the Gerald B.H. Solomon Saratoga National Cemetery in Schuylerville.
Memorial contributions may be made to the Country Meadows Residents’ Activities Fund, Otsego Manor, 128 Phoenix Mills Cross Road, Cooperstown, NY 13326.
Arrangements are with the Connell, Dow & Deysenroth Funeral Home in Cooperstown.

Labels: 07-24-09, Obituaries

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Bound Volumes

175 YEARS AGO
Advertisement – Printing Press for Sale, A FIRST RATE, second hand Washington Printing Press, in good order and will be sold cheap (size of platin 30 and ½ inches by 21 inches) Robert Hoe & Co. Printers Ware-House, 29 and 31 Gold St., New York.
(Ed. Note: This press is believed to be the one used to print The Freeman’s Journal and which is now in the collection of The Farmers’ Museum)
July 28, 1834

150 YEARS AGO
Advertisement – To the barefooted all, both great and small. The subscriber announces that he has just received the largest, best selected and most elegant assortment of boots and shoes that have ever been offered for sale in these diggings, and is able to suit all tastes, and all purses.
He will sell Ladies Gaiter Boots at fifty cents a pair; Gentlemen’s shoes from one dollar to a little more a pair; Masters’ and Misses’ shoes and boots very cheap, and Cacks for little or nothing. He means to be understood as saying to all man and womankind, that he can dress their feet with as elegant patterns, as good material, and as fine workmanship as any person hereabouts can, and he verily believes for a little less money. Come and see. H.N. Robinson, Cooperstown.
July 22, 1859

125 YEARS AGO
Catholic Church Fair – The ladies of the Catholic Church will hold a fair for the benefit of a new Pastoral residence, in the building known as the “Old Stone Bank” at the corner of Main and Fair streets, beginning Tuesday, August 5th, and continuing through the week.
Numerous beautiful and costly articles will be sold by number, such as a silver tea set, a handsome silk quilt, a life size portrait of the late Father Devitt, a china tea set worth $20, a silver cake basket, a set of bedroom furniture, and several other things, besides numberless articles which will be sold outright to anyone desiring to purchase, such as table and stand covers, sofa pillows, toilet sets, pillow shams, quilts, comfortables, lambrequins, dolls, ladies’ and children’s wear, gentlemen’s wear, and in fact, everything one can desire.
Refreshments will also be provided. Come and see for yourself.
July 26, 1884

100 YEARS AGO
The finest choral music ever produced in this village was heard by a congregation that filled Christ Church Sunday morning on the occasion of the dedication of the new organ given by the late Mrs. Elizabeth Scriven Potter as a memorial to Bishop Potter.
The dedicatory service was held at 10:45 o’clock when the choir entered the church in processional singing, without any instrumental accompaniment, the hymn for the dedication of an organ. The rector of Christ Church, the Rev. Ralph Birdsall, proceeded to the organ archway, and after saying versicles and psalms, in which the congregation joined responsively, blessed and dedicated the instrument with prayers and benediction.
It was not until then that Mr. Andrew de J. Allez, choirmaster and organist, touched the keys of the new instrument to play the prelude of Moreton’s setting of Te Deum Laudamus.
July 24, 1909

75 YEARS AGO
Earl Walkins, age 21, of Oklahoma and Claude Traylor, age 29, of Petersburg, Pa., were arrested at the carnival playing in Neahwa Park, Oneonta this week and accused of violating Section 185 of the penal law pertaining to cruelty to animals.
Walkins is said to be “The Wild Man from Borneo” and Traylor is the manager of the act. The pair was arrested on the carnival grounds Tuesday night by A.T. Cassort of Cooperstown, assistant agent for the Otsego County Society for the Prevention of Cruelty to Animals, and patrolman Bert Face of the Oneonta Police Department, after they watched Walkins go through the act of eating live chickens.
July 25, 1934

50 YEARS AGO
The Cooperstown Fire Department’s new Seagrave pumper arrived in Cooperstown Wednesday afternoon from Columbus, Ohio where it was built. It underwent a four-hour test at the lakefront at the foot of Pioneer Street Friday before it was formally accepted by the village trustees. It was assigned to Company No. 2 as a replacement for the 36-year-old Ahrens-Fox pumper, which has been placed on stand-by status.
With the Seagrave’s addition, the department now has two large pumpers, each with a rated pumping capacity of 750 gallons per minute. A smaller pumper is used primarily for out-of-town calls. The new pumper’s complete price was $18,621.
July 22, 1959

25 YEARS AGO
The third ballot for the CCS school budget passed with 1,204 voters balloting, some standing in line for as long as 45 minutes. With a $4.4 million contingency budget together with seven special propositions, the total budget stands at $4.58 million and will mean an average tax increase of 8.2 percent. On the first and second ballots the voters rejected the budget.
Credit for passage may be attributed to Mrs. Jane Johngren, president of the Redskin Booster Club, and others who worked to make sure the budget would be passed.
July 25, 1984

10 YEARS AGO
The Friends of Hyde Hall will express their special appreciation to Anne Clarke Logan for her dedication to their efforts at the Sounds of Summer Picnic and Pops Concert on Sunday evening, July 25 on the lawn of the stately mansion at the north end of Otsego Lake. Hyde Hall was built by Mrs. Logan’s great-great-grandfather between 1817 and 1835 and is regarded as a monument to the great landowning family that built it.
July 23, 1999

Bound Volumes is compiled from resources provided courtesy of the New York State Historical Association Library. Tom Heitz is the Town of Otsego historian.

Labels: 07-24-09, Bound Volumes, Columns

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Letters to the Editor

Only 31 Teams Played At Doubleday This July, Compared To 85 Two Years Ago

To the Editor:
Mr. Bob Lettis, let me tell you that your suspicions are wrong, although I do think that to have a sound government and a village that has life you must have a strong business community.
If you have read my letters over the years, you might understand the position the Village of Cooperstown is in today.
Monday-Friday, July 13-17, Doubleday Field had exactly two paid baseball games.
If you agree with Mr. Katz that someday baseball teams will pay twice the money they paid in 2007, we should consider how much money we have lost waiting for this increased revenue.
In 2007, 85 teams played on Doubleday Field in July; in 2009, 31 teams are paying to play on Doubleday Field.
I’m not so sure it was a good business decision to double the fees and lose more than half the paid games over the last two years.
I once had a stockbroker sell me stock for $70 a share; in the next three days it dropped to $52; that same day, it moved up two points. When I called my broker, he told me I was looking good, the stock was on the move up.
The business decisions made in Cooperstown remind me of the stock broker. I only lost $18 on that stock. In the first quarter of this year our mayor stated that we lost $45,000 in sales tax.
The village looks at sales-tax revenue after the third quarter, I think we will have lost between $120,000 and $150,000.
The loss of these sales-tax revenues is coming directly from the loss of business our merchants are faced with.
The village of Cooperstown is a complex, expensive place to live. The not-for-profit businesses in Cooperstown require the homeowners and business property owners to pay the burden for them to exist in our community.
Sometimes I feel most of the residents of Cooperstown either don’t understand the complexity of this problem or just choose to ignore it.
I am not saying this is a bad thing, but it needs to be dealt with in a joint-venture management effort.
Mr. Lettis and the residents of Cooperstown, if it seems like my letters are only to condemn Mr. Katz and the hard-working boards that serve us, you are wrong.
To think that I write these letters to enhance my business you are also wrong. Every time I write one of these letters, God only knows how many potential customers will not come to my businesses.
My concern is for the love of my community and the future of my eight grandchildren who live in our area. I write these letters so that they will stimulate conversation and thought that otherwise would never happen.
TED HARGROVE
Cooperstown

Give Subsidies To Doctors Who Pursue Primary Care

To the Editor:
The shortage of primary care doctors is becoming crucial. If you doubt this, I suggest you try to make a medical appointed with your primary care doctor. I’m sure all of us have experienced long delays in arranging a doctor’s visit.
Relieving the shortage in primary care doctors has the effect of lowering medical-care costs in the long run and creates better outcomes of medical care.
With universal health care about to become a reality, this problem will become aggravated. Therefore, it seems logical to remedy the situation before universal coverage is in full swing.
An effective plan to increase the number of physicians may be to forgive or reduce the debt that doctors incur for medical training in exchange for service in areas that need better medical coverage.
Many nations have implemented similar plans successfully. Why shouldn’t we do the same? After all, what we have now is not working very well.
Contaact your senator and congressman and suggest this type of program be considered.
Who knows? Maybe this time they might listen.
BRUNO TALEVI
Cooperstown

It’s Likely Only A Few People Will Benefit From Gas Drilling

To the Editor:
Drilling offers grand opportunity for our country of a much needed domestic source of relatively clean energy, for gas companies of huge profits, and for some landowners of a share in those profits.
Opportunities for the rest of our community may be petit.
Jobs for residents may be few, mostly maintenance and security. Sales and sales taxes would be mostly on food and lodging for imported workers and some basic supplies. Local contractors could do well preparing the well sites and regrading them afterwards.
New York State has no severence tax on the gas produced (unlike many other producing states), only a property tax on well site. Fees that our state collects are only about $1,000 per well.
Weighing against these petit opportunities are the various pollutions and costs.
True, in Pennsylvania their faucets are not “running with mud”, but in Dimock, Pa., their faucets are running with cloudy water and natural gas.
The last administration exempted gas drilling from virtually all federal environmental laws. Transporting drilling equipment and supplies can do tremendous damage to local roads, and while local governments can protect their roads, few have passed such laws.
Widespread gas drilling may well be inevitable. Unfortunately the oil and gas industry has a long history of extracting these resources at minimum cost to themselves and leaving communities the cost of cleaning up the mess.
Local opportunities will be few and costs many without much careful planning, including revisions to laws at the federal, state and local levels.
BRIAN BROCK
Franklin

Labels: 07-24-09, Letters to the Editor, Opinion, Perspectives

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In The End, Hall of Fame Will – And Should – Ban Steroid Stars

The first mistake in Zev Chafets’ new and readable book, “Cooperstown Confidential,” is to perceive The Freeman’s Journal, Hometown Oneonta’s sister publication, as a reliable mouthpiece for the powers that be at the National Baseball Hall of Fame.
He quotes a 2007 editorial saying Barry Bonds – if the widely held view that he used steroids stands – cheated and should be barred indefinitely from the Hall of Plaques.
“This isn’t academic,” the quoted editorial continued, “Cooperstown depends on a healthy Hall of Fame, which depends on a healthy sport, which depends on the public’s affection for the National Game.”
We certainly believe that Hall of Fame Chairman Jane Forbes Clark and its president, Jeff Idelson, while they’ve never said so to us, each agree with us in their heart of hearts.
However, the Hall’s public statements, guided by its unavoidable alliance with Major League Baseball – warring team owners and players union alike – have sought to distance it from the steroids controversy – from any controversy, for that matter – by crafting itself as a museum, a library and – by golly, yes – a Hall of Fame.
That’s backwards, and a strategy that, in the end, would be self-defeating.
25 Main St. is, first and foremost, the National Baseball Hall of Fame, repository of “Cooperstown” – fair play, continuity, intergenerational amity, nostalgia – the American Way, if you will, however fuzzy and debated that concept might be.
That a fine museum and superb research arm are attached is nice, but that’s all. Nice.
The essential piece is the National Baseball Hall of Fame, the nation’s gold standard.
•
Take the Vatican. It is likewise a repository of ideals, and it is also an institution of human beings.
Locally, we had the uplifting example of Father Tim Naples, 26 – the first Oneontan ordained in 27 years – saying his first mass in his home parish of St. Mary’s a month ago, summoning parishioners to the ethical truths in the 10 Commandments: “All that the Lord has said, we will do.” Father Naples faces the future with enthusiasm and determination to do good.
And yet, the other day, a priest with ties to Margaretville was arrested, for allegedly molesting boys. Indeed, the spirit may be willing, but the flesh is weak.
Likewise, it’s absurb to say the National Baseball Hall of Fame endorses Babe Ruth’s assignations, the alcoholism that killed Mickey Mantle, Ty Cobb’s racism or Joe DiMaggio’s mob ties.
The Hall of Fame recognizes the on-field accomplishment and endures the shortcomings.
Pete Rose, the relevant example here, was different. He bet on games he participated in. His particular shortcoming was specifically related to his performance on the field. Clearly, the Hall of Fame could not let that stand.
Likewise with steroids. By injecting illegal performance-enhancing drugs – as opposed to snorting cocaine or drinking a martini, which actually may degrade performance on the field – the steroid stars are tilting the playing field.
In effect, they’re cheats, and thus have no place in the Hall of Plaques, (although the scandal should certainly be reflected in the museum – a Hall of Shame, perhaps – and documented in the library.)
•
Read Chavets’ book, by all means.
There’s a great chapter, for instance, “The Monks,” which chronicles the interactions of folks a lot of us around here know: Ted Spencer, Tim Wiles, Gabe Schechter, Jim Gates and so on.
“They weren’t naive,” Chavets writes. “They were aware that many of the players enshrined in the great Hall of Plaques were not embodiments of the Character Clause ... But they didn’t confuse historical failings or contemporary controversies with the essence of the game.”
And there’s a great scene later on: The Monks and Hall of Fame executives sitting in the Grandstand Theater, listening in dead silence to the press conference where the disgraceful findings of the Mitchell Report were laid forth. Chavets was the only journalist to witness it.
“No actual Hall of Famers were named by Mitchell,” he reports Idelson telling the audience when it was over. “That’s good news. We will be getting a permanent copy of the report, which we will put in our archives. Tonight, we’ll be issuing a statement. It will include talking points. Until then, please don’t give anyone your personal opinion.” A great vignette.
That night, the Hall of Fame released a statement in line with its new PR strategy: “Our role as a history museum and educational research center is to make this document available to researchers and fans and, over time, exhibit the impact of the findings in a manner appropriate to its place in the game’s history.”
So that’s it: We’re a museum, not a repository of American dreams, hopes and aspirations. How oily can you get?
To give the Vatican its due, its response to the priest scandal was dilatory and insufficient, but it never renounced core principles.
•
If, as the Hall establishment now claims, its role is scholarly reflection on the National Pastime’s verities, then it’s out of line to tell The Monks, “don’t give anyone your personal opinion.”
Scholarly debate – much-needed here – and adherence to dogma are mutually exclusive; enforce the second and you can’t have the first.
Idelson is a creature of the Hall, so he’s not going off the reservation. The strategy no doubt has Jane Forbes Clark’s imprimatur.
The day of reckoning is coming when she and the Hall will have to stand up and declare: Steroids users cheated. Using performance-enhancing substances is not a personal shortcoming, but erodes the central tenets of “Cooperstown,” the Hall’s central ideal. No pasarán.
That the Hall of Fame continues in the hands of a founding family might be considered an anachronism in a world where publicly held, international conglomerates are the rule. But, as Bill Ford is proving, the pride of tradition, commitment and resolve in privately held entities can, when the chips are down, carry the day.
No, this newspaper is not a mouthpiece for the National Baseball Hall of Fame; sorry, Zev.
Still, we’re confident, when the chips are down on steroids, Jane Forbes Clark will do the right thing.

Labels: 07-24-09, Editorial, Opinion, Perspectives

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