Remembering the Dodgers

Doris Kearns Goodwin's book Wait 'Till Next Year is a great read for baseball fans who grew up in New York City in the late forties and early fifties. Goodwin was indoctrinated as a rabid Brooklyn Dodgers fan by her father and suffered with them through multiple seasons as National League pennant champions only to lose to their nemesis, the New York Yankees. She relates play-by-play of key games in which her heroes Jackie Robinson, Roy Campanella, Gill Hodges, Peewee Reese, and Duke Synder were outstanding stars. She attributes the origins of her historical interest to her compulsive and meticulous keeping of Dodgewr's box scores. The book also brings back the halcyon post-WWII days,blotted by the McCarthy era, the execution of the Rosenbergs, and the Korean War, none of which interfered with her mostly happy suburban childhood in Rockville Center, Long Island. Perhaps it is merely an illusion that goes along with old age, but it is refreshing to reminisce about a time when the most important concern was the outcome of a baseball game. Yes, the Phillies won the World Series and the Eagles went father than anyone dared hope but it just ain't the same.