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Overview
Incredible as it may seem, the following screwball epic is true.
George Edward "Rube" Waddell was a Pennsylvania farm boy born in 1876 who loved to fish, play baseball and chase fire trucks. Rube's catcher with the Philadelphia Athletics, Ossee "Schrek" Schreckengost narrates the astonishing tale.
Rube, a fire-throwing lefthander, bounces around as a teen playing for college teams and local nines, always playing for the highest bidder … or the biggest crowd. He would get his crack at the big leagues with Pittsburgh in 1897.
Unfortunately Rube has a problem respecting authority and he strikes out with Pittsburgh, the Louisville Colonels and Detroit in the minors … before he heads south to Florida to wrestle alligators. For two years.
The best pitching duel of 1900 is Rube - now with Pittsburgh - against Chicago Orphan's big Clarke Griffith. They matched each other with shutout innings to the bottom of the 14th. Rube loses when Griffith smacks a game-winning double. Alas, Rube falls back in his rut with his gun-slinging ways, antagonizes the manager and is sent down to the minors in Punxsutawney, Pennsylvania.
The story could end right here. But Cornelius Alexander McGillicuddy enters the picture. Connie Mack. Mack is Milwaukee's manager at the time. He visits Rube and pries him out of Punxsutawney by first paying off all of Rube's debts. Mack pays Rube salary in installments … ten one-dollar bills at a time.
At a game in Milwaukee, Rube pitches 17 innings in the first game of a double header. The teams agree to play a shortened 5-inning second game. Mack tells Rube that if he pitches the second game, he can go fishing instead of traveling with the team to Kansas City. An hour later, Rube and Milwaukee win 1-0.
Pittsburgh calls Mack. They want Rube back. Rube leads the league in strikeouts but is suspended early the next season and is shipped back down to the minors in Wisconsin.
Joe "Pongo" Cantillon finds him there and convinces Rube to come along with a team Pongo's put together to barnstorm across the country to California in 1901. Rube stays in San Francisco and that's where two Pinkerton guards sent by Connie Mack find him in June of 1902. They bring him to Philadelphia where Mack now manages the Athletics and Schrek will be Rube's new roommate. In the early 1900's, roomies shared the bed.
Waddell won his first game for the Athletics July 1, 1902 and proceeded to win 23 more in just 3 months -- half a season! After which Mack forbade Rube from wrestling alligators. So Rube played rugby instead.
The 1903 season began with Rube meeting his future wife May Wynne Skinner from Boston. They marry but Rube continues to live as only he can. He doesn't pay his board bills. He beats up a heckler at a ball game and is thrown in jail. He hooks up with Cy Young in two memorable games … and continues to eat animal crackers in bed.
After the 1907 season he joins his Philly teammates on a barnstorming tour but his drinking gets the better of him and his teammates vote him off the team. Mack is forced to ship Rube off to the St. Louis Browns for $5000.
In October, 1910, Pongo tracks down Rube. Cantillon takes him to Minnesota where Rube can fish, play ball and "be Rube" for the minor league Minneapolis Millers. It's the perfect world for Waddell. He wins 20 games in 1911 and Cantillon invites him to come stay with him in Kentucky in the off-season.
The spring of 1912 however, brings bad flooding and Rube comes down with a bad case of pneumonia after spending 13 hours in cold water piling sand bags. Tuberculosis sets in the following year and Cantillon sends Rube down to Texas to try and shake the illness … but to no avail.
Rube dies April Fools Day, 1914. He's only 37. His epitaph reads: "Rube Waddell had only one priority, to have a good time." Schrek passes away three years later. Neither lives to see 40. Rube is elected to the Hall of Fame in 1946.
Product Details
| BN ID: | 2940046095630 |
|---|---|
| Publisher: | David Belisle |
| Publication date: | 08/04/2014 |
| Sold by: | Smashwords |
| Format: | eBook |
| File size: | 146 KB |
About the Author
Dave Belisle is a Vietnam War draft dodger ... his mother escorting him north of the border at the tender age of 8. He's returned to Calgary -- not as a Stampede side show -- but to transform that Rocky Mountain air into raucous laughter ... give or take a foothill. There's no armistice on anecdotes, no flat tire in satire ... and your busted funny bone IS covered by Canadian health care.