Latest / Retro Sports Radio: Classic Games from History / 1948 • Baseball Clip • The Dizzy Dean Show - Country Baseball - Radio Broadcast

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1948 • Baseball Clip • The Dizzy Dean Show - Country Baseball - Radio Broadcast · Retro Sports Radio: Classic Games from History

• 0:00
  This is Retro Sports Radio. Visit RetroSeasons.com for more sports history.
• 0:07
  Well, here he is again, folks. Dizzy Dean, brought to you by the makers of Johnson's wax for Carnu.
• 0:14
  The wax fortified auto polish that cleans and polishes your car in one easy application.
• 0:20
  Howdy, everybody. Get around, you young baseball players, especially you city boys.
• 0:25
  I've got a story about kids in the baseball dam, and I believe it's something that all you young fellows can learn a lesson from.
• 0:31
  Coach Dizzy Dean is going into action early today. I can see that.
• 0:35
  This is Frank Eschen to remind you that every Saturday at this time, Dizzy Dean gives advice to baseball-minded young Americans,
• 0:42
  answers letters, that's the mailbag department, spins a few of his inimitable yarns about the great and the near great of the diamond,
• 0:48
  and looks at the big league pennant races.
• 0:51
  And as a starter today, let's have your story for the youngsters, Coach Dean.
• 0:55
  I got this idea just one week ago, Frank. I've been thinking about it a lot.
• 1:00
  Last Saturday after our program for Johnson's car in who I said the path, that's my wife.
• 1:05
  Mrs. Dean, let's take a nice ride somewhere out in the country. I'd like to see a lot of trees and some hills.
• 1:10
  Ah, the great Dean had an urge to commune with nature, to visit pastoral scenes, eh?
• 1:15
  Maybe what you're saying is true, Frank, but I wanted to, all I wanted was to get away from crowds
• 1:20
  and the hot city streets. Well, Pat said it would be all right for us to take a ride.
• 1:25
  The car was just as slick and shiny as any I hear you talking about.
• 1:29
  You see, I feel a responsibility now, and I guess you feel it too, Frank.
• 1:34
  We just got to have shiny cars. Anyhow, we set out for a ride, and I says, let's go out Highway 30.
• 1:41
  That's about as pretty a drive as I know in these here parts. So out Highway 30 we went.
• 1:47
  We left the concrete slab about 30 miles out and took a gravel road in Jefferson County,
• 1:51
  out through the little town of Cedar Hill. It reminded me of the village in Switzerland.
• 1:56
  Why, I didn't know you were such a man of travel, Diz. When were you in Switzerland?
• 2:00
  I never said nothing about being in Switzerland, Frank, but ain't you never heard of moving pictures?
• 2:05
  Go to the movies, I say, and see the world.
• 2:08
  Okay, you win. Go on.
• 2:10
  Well, it was just outside of Cedar Hill, Frank, that I got the idea for something to tell the young ball players about.
• 2:16
  They climbed a hill, rounded a curve, and went down in the kind of a valley,
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  and there on the side of the road was a big open field.
• 2:23
  It was the Cedar Hill baseball field, Frank. Some young fellows had a farm tractor on the infield,
• 2:28
  and they were pulling a big drag. They had that infield smooth as a billiard table.
• 2:33
  And out in the outfield there was another farm tractor pulling a mower.
• 2:37
  They had the weeds down slick as could be.
• 2:39
  You know, Frank, them country kids can learn a thing or two.
• 2:43
  In the big cities they got park baseball diamonds, and they're all ready when the kids show up for a ball game.
• 2:49
  But those country boys really love baseball.
• 2:52
  Here they was Saturday evening when most city kids would be getting ready to go sky-locking
• 2:57
  and manicuring their baseball diamond and mowing the outfield so they have a nice smooth field to play their weekly ball games on.
• 3:05
  I couldn't help thinking what a grip this here game of baseball has on us, Frank.
• 3:10
  Those boys in the small towns really have something, Diz.
• 3:13
  Don't most of the big league ball players come from the little towns, the farms, and the mining country?
• 3:18
  I guess that's because them country kids ain't afraid to work, Frank.
• 3:21
  You see, you can play baseball so much better on a slick field like that.
• 3:25
  The bounces are more truer for the infielders, and the outfielders really got a lot of territory to roam in.
• 3:31
  And that Cedar Hill business gave me another thought, Frank.
• 3:34
  You know, there was a cornfield just beyond the baseball field.
• 3:37
  It wasn't crowding the ball field on, but what I mean is it was good fertile land right there close to the big river.
• 3:44
  But somebody who owned that land thought enough of kids and the kids' right to play baseball to pass up that much of this corn crop
• 3:51
  so them kids could have their baseball diamond and their baseball.
• 3:54
  Frank, there's a lot of big cities that could take a lesson from what I've seen at Cedar Hill.
• 3:59
  Why don't the cities provide more baseball diamonds for the youngsters, Frank?
• 4:03
  You're a good cause, Jerome. More power to that movement for more baseball diamonds for the youngsters.
• 4:08
  But you've lapsed into another very serious mood.
• 4:11
  How about a quick change of pace, Diz, right now, and an anecdote in the manner of Dizzy Dean the Storyteller?
• 4:17
  Okay, Frank, and while we started out about kids, let's go along with that same general idea.
• 4:23
  You remember Babe Herman, don't you?
• 4:25
  Yes, indeed, and that sounds good. Babe Herman was good copy.
• 4:28
  The Babe had traveled around quite a bit, but he was the same old Babe.
• 4:32
  He was playing in Cincinnati and the Cardinals was playing the Reds, and before the game,
• 4:35
  Babe's two children was outside the clubhouse.
• 4:38
  Babe was sure proud of them kids. He always was telling us how bright they was.
• 4:43
  So after shaking hands with the children and giving them freely up my autographs, I said to Babe,
• 4:48
  Babe, you always been bragging about how smart these kids are.
• 4:51
  How about a little demonstration for Pepper Martin and me, right here and now?
• 4:56
  Well, the Babe didn't know nothing he'd rather do than show off them kids.
• 4:59
  So he said to the younger one, Honey, how many is six times two?
• 5:03
  And the youngster spoke real quick and said, Daddy, fourteen.
• 5:08
  And the Babe says, Not bad, eh, Dizzy? He's only one off.
• 5:13
  Well, Pepper Martin got a big laugh out of that, and he says, Babe,
• 5:17
  them really are smart, intelligent children, but that old one seems to be old enough now,
• 5:22
  why don't you get him in a sickle, in solipetica?
• 5:26
  We all agreed that it would be fine out here, but Babe Herman thinks it's over for a while,
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  and then he says, No, Pepper, I don't want to spoil either of them kids.
• 5:35
  Let them walk to school like I did.
• 5:38
  A real colorful character, that Babe Herman.
• 5:41
  He sure was, Frank. I heard one story about him that made my eyes pop out.
• 5:46
  That was back in the lean days of the Dean family, before I hit the jackpot.
• 5:50
  Babe Herman showed up in training camp one spring, and while he was unpacking his trunk,
• 5:54
  he found a paycheck from the summer before that had been in the trunk all winter.
• 5:59
  Frank, it was hard for old Diz with them lean early days to figure how a man could be so rich
• 6:04
  that he'd just throw a paycheck into his trunk and forget all about it, cashing it.
• 6:08
  Then you hit the jackpot, Diz, and I guess as you pitched those masterpieces against Carl Hubbell,
• 6:13
  you too forgot about those checks occasionally.
• 6:16
  Those games were the giants for something, Frank.
• 6:18
  This is just a short story, and it's about that old favorite of mine, Pepper Martin.
• 6:22
  You know, we did have some great games with the giants,
• 6:25
  and I guess one of the toughest hitters I ever faced was the manager of the ball club.
• 6:29
  I'm talking about Bill Terry.
• 6:31
  I always liked to pitch against Bill, even if he did make it kind of rough for me.
• 6:36
  One day I had him two strikes and nothing real quick.
• 6:39
  I tried to sneak the next one through there, and Terry hit it right back through the box.
• 6:43
  A mollum in it. Brother, he liked to took a leg off old Diz's.
• 6:47
  And Pepper Martin was playing third base for us then,
• 6:50
  and while I was getting ready to pitch to the next hitter,
• 6:53
  Pepper walks over to the mound and he was really a grinning.
• 6:56
  He put up his hands so nobody else could hear it, and he says,
• 7:00
  Real serious, Jerome, I don't believe you're playing Terry deep enough.
• 7:04
  Say that Pepper Martin was really something, Diz,
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  and here's something else that is really something.
• 7:09
  You don't mean Johnson's car in who, do you?
• 7:11
  That's just what I mean.
• 7:13
  Tell them about it, Frankie boy.
• 7:15
  Well, men, when this program is over, take a good look at your car.
• 7:18
  Does the finish really sparkle, really shine the way you want it to?
• 7:22
  Now, I'm not suggesting that your car isn't clean,
• 7:25
  but you know as well as I do you can sponge your car till your arm feels like lead
• 7:29
  and still come out with a pretty dull-looking finish.
• 7:32
  And the reason is usually road film.
• 7:34
  A road film composed of tree sap, oil, exhaust fumes, a lot of different things.
• 7:40
  Water can't touch that film, but Johnson's wax-fortified car new zips it away,
• 7:45
  and car new polishes your car too.
• 7:48
  Johnson's car new cleans and polishes your car in one easy application.
• 7:53
  You rub it on, and the five cleaning ingredients in car new go to work.
• 7:57
  Penetrate road film in practically nothing flat.
• 8:00
  Then wipe it off, and your car is polished as well as cleaned,
• 8:04
  because car new is wax-fortified.
• 8:07
  So why wear yourself out cleaning and polishing your car in the ordinary way?
• 8:11
  Today, get some Johnson's wax-fortified car new from your nearest dealer or service station.
• 8:17
  That is C-A-R-N-U car new.
• 8:20
  Might as well use it today.
• 8:22
  Might as well have a car with a bright, brilliant, sunny shine tomorrow.
• 8:27
  Now it's mailbag time, dears, and here's a letter from Colonel Harry Taylor of Dublin, Georgia,
• 8:32
  who remembers you as a great pitcher who occasionally ran into unusual excitement on the baseball field.
• 8:37
  He says that as he remembers it, you had a fistfight once with Al Todd in the Texas League,
• 8:42
  and later with the entire New York Giant Ball Club at Sportsman's Park here in St. Louis.
• 8:46
  Glad to hear from Colonel Taylor, Frank.
• 8:48
  I played an exhibition game in Dublin one time.
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  They got a real Southern hospitality down there in Georgia.
• 8:54
  About them two fights, Frank, I guess I was overmatching both of them.
• 8:57
  Sounds good. Let's have the story of an overmatched Dizzy Dean.
• 9:00
  Well, that Todd story won't take long.
• 9:03
  Al got the idea one day that I was throwing at him,
• 9:06
  just because he got a base hit.
• 9:08
  I didn't throw at him, Frank. Honest, I didn't.
• 9:11
  Or maybe I was trying to move him back from the plate, just a little.
• 9:14
  Anyhow, Al got the idea I was throwing at him, and the next time up,
• 9:18
  and he charges out to the mound.
• 9:20
  I figured I could out-talk him, but he didn't say a word.
• 9:23
  I was waiting, and I had a good wise crack to let him have.
• 9:27
  But he popped me without a word, and I kept picking myself up, and he kept knocking me down.
• 9:33
  Yes, I guess I was overmatched, Frank.
• 9:35
  And honest confession is good for the soldier, Rome.
• 9:38
  And now that rumpus with the Giants.
• 9:40
  I guess Colonel Taylor must be referring to the famous row with the day George Barr called a balk on old ears.
• 9:46
  Well, Frank, a lot of funny things happened that afternoon, but I didn't have no fight with nobody.
• 9:51
  I came in out fat without swinging a fist and without getting a scratch.
• 9:55
  But both teams were on the field swinging, and it looked like a long time to get order restored.
• 10:00
  In the center of all the fussing and the feuding,
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  two catchers, Gus Mancuso and Mickey Owen, had a little harmless wrestling match.
• 10:07
  Mickey figured everybody ought to take a man.
• 10:09
  He was a catcher, so he chose Mancuso, the Giants' catcher, and said,
• 10:13
  Gus, let's wrestle.
• 10:15
  Well, when they got everybody quiet, it looked up that Mancuso and Owen was the only ones caught doing anything for sure.
• 10:22
  So they was ordered out of the game.
• 10:24
  The only man hurt that day was the most peaceful guy on the field, little Don Guthridge.
• 10:29
  He didn't hit nobody, but somebody sure hit him.
• 10:32
  He came out the scrap with the most beautiful black eye I ever seen.
• 10:36
  What a shiner that was.
• 10:38
  Frankie Frisch, our dandy little manager, was furious.
• 10:40
  When they put out Owen, Frisch said to umph, Barr,
• 10:43
  How about bouncing Mel Oht, too?
• 10:46
  What far, Barr wanted to know?
• 10:48
  For hitting little Guthridge, Frisch told him.
• 10:50
  Barr said he hadn't seen nobody hit Guthridge and started to walk away.
• 10:54
  But Leo DeRosha tells Barr,
• 10:56
  Ain't you gonna put Luke out of the game? What far, says Barr, for hitting Guthridge, says DeRosha.
• 11:02
  Just then Barr ran into Jess Haynes, and old Pop says,
• 11:06
  George, you aren't going to let Chaoza stay in the game, are you?
• 11:10
  And Barr says, Mr. Haynes, you're not gonna tell me that Chaoza hit Guthridge.
• 11:15
  He sure did hit him, George, Haynes insisted.
• 11:18
  Just look at that eye.
• 11:19
  Barr did look at Guthridge's eye, and he said afterward that the way it looked,
• 11:23
  Maybe everybody on the giant club had teed off on poor little Don.
• 11:27
  Yeah, but Diz, isn't that one of those rare cases where anybody actually got hurt in a baseball, Donnybrook?
• 11:32
  I mean, usually it's largely a matter of exchanging words at any given number of paces,
• 11:37
  But seldom a blow landed.
• 11:38
  That's right, Frank. In the excitement of a ball game, players will pop off and say things they really don't mean.
• 11:44
  Sometimes they'll even scrap among themselves on the bench or in the clubhouse,
• 11:48
  Especially in a tight-pinnant race, with everybody pulling hard and so,
• 11:52
  And the dough hanging on every play.
• 11:54
  Like the time we lost a tough ball game in New York,
• 11:57
  An outfielder and an infielder on the old Gas House gang got to join at each other when we got into the clubhouse.
• 12:03
  But the race was hot and in the stretch, and everybody was pretty well keyed up right then.
• 12:08
  They started swinging at each other as soon as they got into the clubhouse.
• 12:12
  We all started to break it up, but Manager Frank Ifrish had his own idea.
• 12:16
  He says, Stand back, fellas. Give them room. Don't nobody interfere.
• 12:21
  So the outfielder and the infielder swung at each other.
• 12:24
  They couldn't hit their weight fighting, though, and ball players ain't trained for boxing.
• 12:28
  They soon got out of wind, and you could see both was wanting to hear the bell.
• 12:33
  Then Ifrish stepped in and asked real fancy, if each one felt now that he had defended his honor satisfactorily,
• 12:39
  They both agreed as they had, so Ifrish made them put their arms around each other and then shake hands.
• 12:45
  You're both on the same team, see? Frankie told them.
• 12:49
  So fight the other fellows from here on. Don't fight amongst yourselves.
• 12:53
  Ah, better than average psychologists, that Ifrish.
• 12:55
  Now, Mr. Dean, we come to the right and wrong part of the program.
• 12:58
  That is, how right and how wrong have you been in your prognostications?
• 13:02
  Let's look at that big league picture as it is today. Mr. Dean, the reporter.
• 13:07
  Frank, I'm satisfied right now if I can be just half right the way those ball clubs are scrambling around.
• 13:13
  But let's forget the top of the pennant races for a while.
• 13:16
  I want to say something about a club down into the second division of the American League.
• 13:20
  I'm talking about the St. Louis Browns.
• 13:22
  And what about the Browns make you select them for your spotlight, Professor Dean?
• 13:26
  A couple of young ball players, Frank. Their names is Dick Kokos and Hank Arp.
• 13:31
  And they're giving the Browns a big lift. And they're going to help the Browns in more ways than one, Frank.
• 13:36
  Elucidate, Diz, elucidate.
• 13:38
  It's this way, Frank. When a couple of young fellows get a chance in it, it attracts a lot of attention.
• 13:43
  The Browns brought Arp and Kokos up from Toledo. That's a great break for them kids.
• 13:48
  And it's good advertising for the Browns. Here's the way it works.
• 13:51
  Kids all over the country wanting to get ahead as fast as possible will hear about this.
• 13:56
  And they'll say, them Browns are the club that is giving young fellows a chance right now.
• 14:01
  And so the young ball players will be looking for some Brownish scout to show up.
• 14:05
  And folks, we hope you'll show up again at this same time next week to listen to Dizzy Dean.
• 14:10
  He's brought to you by Johnson's Carnu, a wax fortified auto polish that cleans and polishes your car in one easy application.
• 14:18
  Rub it on and Carnu cleans your car. Cuts through and carries away road film that water won't touch.
• 14:25
  Wipe it off and Carnu polishes your car. Remember to give your car a Sunday shine, rub it on, wipe it off.
• 14:32
  That's all you do with Carnu.
• 14:35
  And this is Old Dez. Hope all you folks understand this time next Saturday I'll be pitching a cross again for Johnson's Carnu.
• 14:43
  This is Frank Eschen saying goodbye until next Saturday for the makers of Johnson's wax fortified auto polish Carnu.
• 14:51
  This program came to you from KSD St. Louis.
• 14:56
  This is NBC, the national broadcasting company.
• 15:01
  Thank you for watching.