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The Newsletter of the Halsey Hall Chapter
Society for American Baseball Research (SABR)

 

September 2000

Mark Johnson One of Nine All-Time Twins Fans
Joe O’Connell Elected President
Fall Chapter Meeting Saturday, October 14
The Latest from Gos
The Holy Cow! on the Web
Dr. Fan on the Road
Cow Chips
Chapter Profile
Directory Update
Dues
September Birthdays
Quicksteps
Calendar
Board of Directors

Mark Johnson Selected as One of Nine All-Time Twins Fans
Mark Johnson was honored prior to the Twins-Blue Jays game on Friday night, August 11, as one of the team’s all-time fans. He was introduced before the game and got to go out to the shortstop position (with each of the other all-time fans taking other positions), where he stood with Cristian Guzman during the national anthems.

Mark was selected on the basis of the essay he submitted, explaining why he felt he was the all-time Twins fan: “I have attended and scored 1,086 Twins games, including 84 percent of the games since our first World Series championship in 1987.

“I remember well the emotions of attending the last Twins game at the Met in 1981 and the excitement of the Twins Metrodome Opener in 1982.

“Winning is great but overrated. Over the years I have especially enjoyed the defensive gems on the field, the well-placed hit, or a choice piece of strategy. Every Twins game is different and exciting.”

Congratulations, Mark, on a well-deserved honor.

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Joe O’Connell Elected President
Joe O’Connell was elected president of the Halsey Hall Chapter for 2000-01 at the board of directors meeting on August 6. Cary Smith was re-elected vice president, Rich Arpi elected secretary, and Kevin Hennessy re-elected treasurer.

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Fall Chapter Meeting Saturday, October 14
The Halsey Hall Fall Chapter Meeting will be held at United Methodist Church in Columbia Heights on Saturday, October 14, with registration beginning at 8:30 a.m.

The meeting will consist of the usual format of research presentations, featured guests, and a trivia quiz. That night, there will be a party at the Thornley-Himrich home in Roseville to watch the baseball playoffs and assemble a jigsaw puzzle of Norman Rockwell’s “Bottom of the Sixth” painting.

For more information about the meeting, contact Joe O’Connell at 651-776-8093.

The Latest from Gos
Glenn Gostick has compiled a list of players, ranking them in terms of their home run dominance. The Dominance Factor (DF) is derived by dividing the at bats per home run of the hitter’s peers by the at bats per home run of the hitter. The list covers only players with a minimum of 150 at bats or who are in the Hall of Fame. Not surprisingly, Babe Ruth is at the top of the list with a career Dominance Factor of 8.783 (Ruth’s home runs per at bat being 11.763 with that of his peers being 103.314). Cy Williams, with a DF of 4.501, is second. The top current player is Mark McGwire, whose DF is 3.347 (13th on the list). Sammy Sosa, in 66th place, has a DF of 2.377. (Harmon Killebrew has a DF of 2.903, good for 23rd place, just behind Joe DiMaggio, who is just behind Dave Kingman.)

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The Holy Cow! on the Web
Current and past issues of The Holy Cow!, the newsletter of the Halsey Hall Chapter, are now on the chapter’s web site, in both HTML and PDF formats. Click on “Newsletters“ within the web site or go directly to: http://members.aol.com/halseyhall/Holy.html

Dr. Fan on the Road
Seth C. “Dr. Fan” Hawkins is working on a book that will provide an analytical look at major league baseball stadiums that have opened in the last dozen years. Here are some of his observations (not necessarily the ones that will be used in his book) after a recent trip that took him to Pacific Bell Park in San Francisco and Safeco Field in Seattle.

Pacific Bell Park: “No $60 seats, no glassed-in restaurant facing the field, few gimmicks, but the concealed modern evil of personal seat licenses. . . . The San Francisco press box had good tea and real Coca-Cola; no bottled H2O, but mediocre strawberry twizzlers. . . . Roving souvenir vendor (whose inventory included those foam ‘We’re #1’ hands: ‘Bats, Balls, Fingers!’”

Safeco Field: “Near home plate in the concourse: superb huge Chinese dinner for $6.50. Mine had rice, chicken, many enormous cashews, red pepper, green and yellow squash, carrots. Also offered: beef/broccoli or vegeterian. . . . I asked for tea in the media dining room. Trying to be helpful, the staffer said, ‘We have hot water; you could bring your own tea bag.’ Duh! . . . Gratifying to walk past diminishing rubble pile of ex-Kingdome.”

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Cow Chips
Ray Luurs made it to Wrigley Field for the first time, watching Jon Lieber of the Cubs shut out the Pirates on July 3. . . . Howard Luloff won a dry-cleaning certificate at a St. Paul Saints game and used it to get his Quicksteps uniform cleaned. . . . Heidi Rittenhouse, daughter of Paul, went to the ASA National Regional Tournament in Indianapolis in mid-August. Heidi’s team had finished fifth in the Minnesota state tournament to earn the trip to the regionals.

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Chapter Profile
Jeremy “Jed” Levitt has been a member of the Halsey Hall Chapter since 1992 and is a past member of the board of directors. He is a lab technician, analyzing water samples for Pace Laboratories in Minneapolis. Jed went to his first Twins game in 1973, when he was six. His fan highlights include seeing Mike Cubbage and Kirby Puckett hit for the cycle, Bert Blyleven get his 3,000th strikeout, and Cal Ripken get his 3,000th hit.

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Directory Update
    The chapter welcomes two new members:
Dick Jonckowski
1138 Tyler Street
Shakopee, Minnesota 55379
952-445-2071

Bob Karn
1325 N. 10th Avenue
St. Cloud, Minnesota 56303
320-252-8227

    New Address and Phone:
Dr. Dennis Irons
318 Cataract Avenue, #2
Waterloos, Iowa 50613

    Address Correction:
J. D. Parsley
4278 Boulder Ridge Point
Eagan, Minnesota 55122

    New E-mail Address
Kevin Hennessy: bbwsmin@altavista.com

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Dues
If you haven’t already done so, please submit your subscription dues of $12. If you’re not sure of your dues status, contact Treasurer Kevin Hennessy at 651-227-5183 or via e-mail at BBWSMIN@aol.com.

Send a check, made out to Halsey Hall Chapter, to Kevin Hennessy, 608 Grand Avenue, St. Paul, Minnesota 55102.

What’s This Money For?
In response to questions from members regarding the newsletter and subscription dues, here’s some basic information. Annual subscription dues of $12 pay for the monthly The Holy Cow! newsletter, a two-page publication with news about members and chapter events, as well as the quarterly journal, The Holy Cow Extra. The subscription dues also entitle a SABR member to a listing in the Halsey Hall Chapter Directory and a copy of the directory, which comes out in the fall. Dues are due July 1 of each year. Members who join during the year may or may not have to pay dues again on the following July 1. Those who joined before January 1 will have to pay dues; those who joined after January 1 will not have to. Renewal notices will begin in The Holy Cow! in the May issue and continue through the October issue. Those who have not renewed their dues by that time will have their subscription dropped, although their listing in the directory will be retained in the upcoming directory.

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September Birthdays
    1—Jim Wyman (also Jim O’Rourke, Rico Carty, Cloyd Boyer, Rob Wilfong, Hub Pruett, and Conway Twitty)
    11—Mark Johnson (also Don "Sluggo" Slaught, John McSherry, Ellis Burks, Byrum Saam, and O. Henry)
    13—Julian Loscalzo (also Rick Wise, Rick Dempsey, Ed Rommel, Bernie Williams, Thornton Lee, Mel Torme, and Jacqueline Bisset)
    21—Dan Levitt (also Sam McDowell, Cecil Fielder, Eldon Auker, Elmer Smith, and Larry Hagman)

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Quicksteps
The Quicksteps, the Chapter’s vintage base ball nine, will finish the season with a match at Scandia on September 9 and one in Winona on September 17.

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Calendar
    October 7—Hot Stove Saturday Morning, 8:30 a.m., Baker’s Square, 66th and Xerxes, Richfield

    October 14—Fall Chapter Meeting, United Methodist Church, Columbia Heights

Halsey Hall Chapter
Board of Directors 1999-2000
President—Joe O’Connell
Vice President—Cary Smith
Secretary—Rich Arpi
Treasurer—Kevin Hennessy
Dan Levitt
Bob Tholkes
Jim Wyman

Webmaster—Cary Smith

The Holy Cow! Editor—Stew Thornley  

Please direct news about chapter events, about yourself or about other chapter members to:
S. Thornley
1082 Lovell Avenue
Roseville, Minnesota 55113-4419
E-mail Stew Thornley

http://member.aol.com/halseyhall/Home.html

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