The Holy Cow, February 2004

Twins-Fest and Hot Stove Recaps

The last few weekends have been busy ones for chapter regulars as the annual Twins-Fest and chapter hot stove meetings were held at the Metrodome and the residence of Kevin Hennessy, respectively. For the umpteenth year in a row (how is that for historical accuracy?) the Halsey Hall Chapter of SABR had a booth at the Twins fan festival at the Metrodome the weekend of January 23-25. Twins Fest is a great opportunity to spread the SABR message and publicize the activities of the Halsey Hall Chapter. This year we got immediate dividends with two new members (Darrell Skogen on the spot and Gregg Nelson a day or two later). We handed out enough brochures that we may have to reprint the brochure for next year. Kudos to chapter members Tom Swift, Chuck Blomquist, Stew Thornley, Cary Smith, Bob Tholkes, Joe O’Connell, Lee Temanson, Roger Godin, Howard Luloff and Rich Arpi for working at the chapter booth this year.

The next Saturday night (January 31st) sixteen chapter members meet at Kevin Hennessy’s home at 608 Grand Avenue in St. Paul for an evening of food, refreshment and baseball talk. This year Bob Tholkes showed the 2003 Quicksteps Vintage Baseball Video (club members talked about their most memorable game or games of the 2003 season interspersed with some game action) and Jim Sexton brought along a video of baseball newsreel clips from the 1910s through the 1940s. By my count (regrets if I missed anyone) attendees where Kevin H. (host), Jed and Dan Levitt, Jerry Janzen, Howard Luloff, Stew Thornley, Rich Arpi, Joe O’Connell, Bob Evans, Bob Tholkes, Gregg Nelson, Mark Johnson, Jim Sexton, Fred Buckland, Brenda Himrich, and Jim Wyman. Oh, yes Satchel was there as well. Not the Pitchin’ Man but Kevin’s dog who seemed happy to meet everyone by sicking his nose in their lap.

Cheer up Winter haters.....

Only a few more weeks and Spring Training starts. .

Spring Meeting

The chapter board of directors has decided to hold the Spring chapter meeting on Saturday May 1st, an available date since the fall of the communist party and folks not having to travel to Moscow anymore for the big parade.

Members with research presentations should contact Howard Luloff at 952-922-5036 or hfan77@webtv.net. Tentative guest will be Roy Smalleyplace most likely the United Community Methodist Church at 980 Gould Avenue in Columbia Heights starting at 9:00 a.m. Anaheim will be the Twins opponent that night. Tickets are $ 15.00; contact Howard as well.

The Chapter book club meet on Sunday evening, February 8th, after the chapter board meeting, at the residence of Bob Tholkes. Discussion centered around the books of relief pitcher Jim Brosnan entitled The Long Season and Pennant Race. The Long Season is his diary of the 1959 season (spent with the Cards and Reds) and Pennant Race is his diary of the 1961 season (spent with the NL winning Reds). While I was somewhat disappointed that Pennant Race ends with the close of the season in late September (an account of a player playing the World Series in his home town...Brosnan a Cincinnati native ...would have added a nice touch to the book). Anyway both books are highly regarded and were among the first player diaries of a current season and paved the way for books such as Bouton’s Ball Four and Lyle’s The Bronx Zoo. There was some discussion on the different writing styles of Brosnan and Bouton and how changing times allowed Bouton to talk more about off the field activities of ball players while Brosnan’s books centered on bull-pen banter, game action (how to pitch to so and so etc.), and his interactions with other players, coaches and managers.

The next book will be Stew Thornley’s manuscript of Minnesota baseball history. Contact Stew (at 651-415-0791 or stew@stewthornley.net) so he can send you a electronic copy or a paper copy. This will be an opportunity for chapter members to comment on a book manuscript and to interact with the author and to provide helpful suggestions to improve the book before a final draft is written. The next meeting will be Sunday evening, April 4th, at 5 p.m. at Rich Arpi’s condo in Maplewood.

The SABR Pictorial Committee is presently working on the player pictorial index. There are many goals to the index, but the main object is to have information for at least one picture of every player who reached the major leagues from 1871 to current. We will not be providing actual pictures of players but only the information on where the pictures can be found. There are currently over 20,000 photos catalogued of more than 15,000 different players, making the project 90% complete. Most of the players that have not been added to the index either played during the 19th century or played in less than 10 major league games. Every post-World War II player has been catalogued thanks to the help of Bill Hickman. For the more contemporary players the index will include pictures of the player wearing a jersey from all the different teams he played for.

The next step in the index is to place the completed parts online so that members can have access. If a SABR member is looking for a picture of Vince Ventura (18 games for Washington in 1945) they can find that there is a black and white photo of the Oswego team, including Ventura, on page 275 of the 1941 Spalding Guide. Besides the guides, photos have been found in newspapers, baseball cards, books, and independent photos.

After the player index is considered complete the pictorial commitee is considering a similar index for photographs of coaches and managers and also an index for ballpark photographs. I do not see an end to any of these pictorial projects any time soon. There will always be new players joining the major leagues, new coaches and managers and stadiums will always be changing. Cary Smith, committee vice chairman

New Subscribers

Since last month’s issue, The Holy Cow has picked up four new subscriptions which means our mailing list is now at 80. This includes 56 people getting the paper edition; 22 getting the electronic version and two free subscriptions (paper copies) to the SABR National Office and to the Minnesota Historical Society. The new subcribers are Michael Cramer of Breezing Point, Kevin Reichard of Minnetonka and Gregg Nelson and Darrell Skogen of Maple Grove. Welcome gentlemen!

Breakfast Meeting

is scheduled for Saturday March 6 at the usual location of the Baker’s Square at 66th and Xerxes in Richfield at 9:30. Some chapter members also plan to attend the Gophers baseball game vs. Nebraska that night at 6:30 at the Dome. Meet in section 129.