Last Days of Summer (13 page)

Dear Charlie,

Please please please please please please please please

please please please please please please please please

please please please please please please please please

please please please please please please please please

please please please please please please please please

please please please please please please please please

please please please please please please please please

please please please please please please please please

please please please please please please please please

please please please please please please please please

please please please please please please please please.

Joey

Dear Joey,

That is the last time I ever let you pick the movie. Even at the Radio City. Or maybe I missed something. He starts a newspaper then grows a mustashe and screws everybody except his wife. That took 2 hours. And the only thing we find out is that he called his sled Rose Bush? Your taste is in your ear.

Some things to remember.

1. Mister Terry only has one rule but with 4 parts in it. No drinking, no gambling, no late hours and no women. This goes double for you. All of it.
   
2. You get ten per and cakes. This is player talk and it means two fins per game and barley. Come to think of it, this is player talk too and it means $10 and eats. I can not spell it out any better than that. You can have $2 of it but your mother gets the rest.
   
3. Your job is to hand us our bats and shut up. Last night at the Radio City you did not talk for almost 10 minutes so I know you can do it.
   
4. A couple of times a day I will ask you such questions as “What did God say to Noah?” and “How many floors were in the Ark?” and etc. If you know the answers in both languages you can go out with us after the game. If you don't, your grounded at the hotel.
   
5. If you get homesick just tell me and we can call your Mom and Aunt Carrie. It does not mean your a baby or anything like it.
   
6. The sleeper to Boston leaves at 11:00 in the P.M. on Sunday night. Craig can come to the Pennsylvania Station with us but only if he does not sneak on the train. I will check your suitcases right after All Aboard just to make sure he is not in one of them.
   
7. For the next 2 weeks your a NY Giant. Don't forget it.
   

Happy birthday again.

Charlie

P.S. They stopped writing about Stuke's triple play on account of DiMaggio. So Stuke started a hitting streak of his own. Right now it is up to 2 games.

Dear Charlie,

The cat's out of the bag. Rabbi Lieberman called our house today to find out if you had a talus and a yarmulke already or if you wanted to buy one from the Temple just in case. But my Mom was out shopping for pillowcases so Aunt Carrie answered the phone instead. And even though she sometimes does boneheaded things like make gefilte fish for Pistol Pete Reiser, she's no dummy and it didn't take her long to put two and two together. First she told my Mom she was going to open a vein, and then she said she was going to stick her head in the oven. But instead she called Edith Snyder and they went to Gimbel's Tea Room for lunch. That always gets her back to normal. And Robert Montgomery kissing her
probably helped you out too. The last thing she said to my mother before she closed the subject was, “All right, Ida. A man who's willing to learn the Torah can't be all bad even if he is a Gentile. But if my nephew marries a shikse, let it be on your head.” So I think you're winning.

I'm bringing my crystal set with me on the road because Craig says that in Boston you can pick up signals from Berlin. I think he's full of shit but what if he's not?

Joey

DiMaggio Stopped at 56; Giants Hit the Road

N
EW
Y
ORK
, July 17. Indians hurlers Al Smith and Jim Bagby joined forces in a front-line assault on Joltin' Joe DiMaggio at Cleveland tonight, and ended the Yankee Clipper's unassailable hitting streak at 56 consecutive games—the longest in baseball's history.

“At least we won the game,” DiMaggio told his teammates when it was over. “Now let's get out there and win some more.”

Behind the formidable pitching of Lefty Gomez, New York held Cleveland to four hits and one run before threatening in the ninth, when fireman Johnny Murphy put out the blaze for good. The final score: Yanks 4, Redskins 3.

DiMaggio was retired three times and walked once.

Meanwhile, Bill Terry's fourth-place New York Giants begin a two-week road trip that will take them to Boston, Cincinnati and Chicago. Whether they can gain any ground on the seemingly unstoppable Dodgers and Cards depends largely upon Carl Hubbell's arm, Charlie Banks' bat, and Jordy Stuker's glove. Skipper Terry is hoping that the injury-plagued lineup will be able to repair itself in time for the next

Dear Hazel,

Right now I am stuck in a compartment all alone on The Patriot Limited looking out of the window at Connecticut trees in the dark, and I can't get out because Charlie won't let me. I'm very sad. I thought this was supposed to be a birthday present, but as soon as we got here he turned into General MacArthur or somebody. And the only thing I did was show my best friend Craig what a peachy keen train this was and after he left I played a couple games of Old Maid with Stuke and Mel and Burge, even though I kept losing. But Charlie yells at me for
every
thing. Even when I was hungry and went to get a hamburger.

Could you please tell him to lay off? Just a little bit? Smokes, I'm only a boy. And maybe I'm also sort of scared because this is my first time away from home. Thanks.

Love,
Joey

Dear Toots,

I think you better learn how to bake cakes with such things in them as files and saws and etc. because after I kill this kid I will be doing a long stretch in the Jug. Right now he is locked in our compartment on the train and the only one who has the key is the porter who is not allowed to open it up for anybody but me. But that does not stop him from trying to bribe whoever he hears walking outside. Mel Ott almost said yes for $20.

This road trip is only 2 hrs. old and I already feel like I just played 3 double headers. I should of seen it coming before we even left the Pennsylvania Station. Him and the Japanese kid were wearing the exact same shirts and pants and shoes and socks on purpose so that if you looked at them real fast and did not notice such things as eyes and etc. you would think they were the same brat and get mixed up in the head, especially if you were a conducter. The railroad had to throw Craig off the train 3 times while we were still in the station and the 3d time was because they caught the 2 of them in the diner eating burgers and shakes and charging it to the NY Giants. So I booted Craig out the door, put Joey in the compartment, and told him not to move until I got back. This was on account of his family on the platform who were not finished with me yet. The mother gave me a bag of more pointy coconut things which I should of never told her I liked due to there being enough of them to feed Massachusets and part of Road Island, and also a briskit with directions in writing about heating it up and gravy and etc., like I would know what to do with an oven even if they
gave us one which they don't. Then it was the Aunt's turn to give a speech about Joey's teeth. I always thought there was only one way to do it. You put the powder on the damn brush and then stick it in your mouth and call it a ball game. But she had enough instructions to build a B-17 bomber, and then finished by telling me that if I did not keep him away from the bad element, let it be on my head. What a laugh. He is the bad element. Then we left. But when I got back to the compartment the kid was gone. Where he was was at the other end of the smoker with Stuke's dice and the whole team around him, rolling 7's and saying such things as “Aunt Carrie needs a new girdle” and etc. By the time I got there he was in the middle of a joke that started with Superman flying over the beach and seeing Wonder Woman lying there on her back naked with her legs open and ended with Wonder Woman saying “What was that?” and the Invisible Man saying “I don't know but my asshole sure hurts.” And when the little shit said asshole there was a space in the middle. After that I locked him up.

Before you read in Winchell that the police are looking for me, remember that you thought this was a good idea too.

I love you.

Charlie

P.S. If you want to take the mother and the Aunt out to lunch while we are gone, let it be on your head. But do not do it because you think they miss him. If I was them I would pack up and move before he came back. And don't think your going to get anywhere with the Aunt.

Dear Hazelnut,

Don't worry. Me & the guys got together & decided we'll take turns looking out for Sprout. We have to. That kid's got all our money.

We beat Boston 5–4 in tonight's opener. It took him a little while to get the hang of things—I guess when you're 13 & all of a sudden you find yourself in a dugout at Braves Field wearing a Giants uniform, it hits you pretty hard. But once he finally got it, it sure happened fast. Buddy Hassett was up on a 3–0 count when Sprout started calling out things like “No batter, no batter. Take three & sit down.” Mister Terry thought we should shut him up, until Hassett struck out. After that they didn't stand a chance. By the way, I snapped a couple of great shots before the game—your boyfriend was showing the kid how to grip a bat. They looked like Mutt & Jeff.

I read in Photoplay that Ingrid Bergman likes khaki. Since we're going to wind up in this damn war anyway, do you think if I enlisted now I'd have a better shot at her? The paper says we only have 500,000 men in uniform. I can compete with that. 10 million I can't. If you know her, tell her I'll do whatever she wants.

Stuke

P.S. And how come Carole Lombard never returns my calls?

P.P.S. The first three streaks were only for practice. This one's the real thing. 4 games now.

New York Giants

BATBOY: Margolis PARK: Braves Field, Boston

—C
HECK
L
IST
—

ALL ITEMS MUST BE COMPLETED ONE HOUR PRIOR TO GAME TIME.

N
OTES: