Stan Musial : An American Life by George Vescey

When I was young I loved reading sports biographies. I remember reading a book that had bios of players like Honus Wagner and Rogers Hornsby. This was probably fourth, fifth grade level. Much like we heard George Washington chopped down a cherry tree, I remember in this book hearing of Hornsby being told at the end of spring training when a young player that he needed to be sent down to the farm for a season. Hornsby, in the story returned to his families farm, worked hard, and came back twenty pounds stronger, made the team and the rest is history.

Now as an adult I would suspect that much of that story is fiction. Still the seed was planted and I devoured this kind of book for years.

As an adult I have moved away from that sort of book. History and Biography with classic lit has become my passion. Still as a huge baseball fan I have revered Ted Williams and also been interested in the career of Stan Musial.

Learning more about him one becomes convinced that just based on the baseball numbers he was a wonderfully underrated player. 3600 hits, 400 homeruns. 3 MVP's and 24 All Star Teams for a start.

Vescey in his book tells us many things about the man we did not know. The season of his first call up to the big leagues for September Musial had started as a sore armed left handed pitcher. As that part of his career faded his hitting took over and he was fortunate.

He became a power hitter but his natural stroke was to go the other way. Still from the book what we gain most is insight into the man beyond baseball. We see him being raised by a father who struggled in the mines of Donora, Pennsylvania.

We see countless examples of his being polite and generous with strangers, friends, families and anyone he came into contact with. Friends, teammates, countless people recall their interactions with Musial as kind and generous. Where there is smoke there is fire, Musial was a wonderful player but a genuinly kind one also, clearly he appreciated from where he came to where he was.

After baseball Musial for one season was the GM of the World Series winning 67 Cards though he admitted he was overmatched in the postion and was fortunate to have a club that took care of itself.

Later in life he and his lifelong friend the author James Michener, one of my favorites, traveled all over the country, Rome, Poland and even met the Pope. Musial became very active in Polish causes.

Known for his harmonica playing he enjoyed the Hall of Fame festivities each year. The book is not an expose biography. Still the amount of vignettes told by strangers and friends alike give us a measure of the man.

This past spring suffering from Alzeimer's diesease he was awarded the Medal of Freedom from President Obama and St Louis and the country applauded.

Often overhadowed by the brass Williams and the debonair and distant Dimaggio Musial remained what he always was. A gentleman. What more need we say.