Stan Musial: An American Life by George Vecsey

Author:George Vecsey [Vecsey, George]
Language: eng
Format: epub
Tags: General, Sports & Recreation, History, Biography & Autobiography, Sports, Baseball
ISBN: 9780345526441
Publisher: ESPN
Published: 2011-05-10T00:00:00+00:00

IN OTHER ways, Stan and Lil were not the prototypical suburban family.

“My parents were so glamorous,” Gerry said, recalling Stan and Lil all dressed up, going out.

“It was so normal for him to be my father, for him to do great things,” Gerry said. “We’d wait for him after the games and all these people would wait, just to get his autograph, and then he comes, just running out of the clubhouse, and we would take off with him, running, because he was our ride home. The crowd would shove us out of the way because they thought we were autograph seekers, but then you would get in the car, and they would surround the car and you could barely drive off.

“In those days, there was no secret passage the way they might have now. He was across the street from Sportsman’s Park and, you know, we could barely drive. He just signed and signed and he would say, ‘What do they do with all of those? We must have signed a million of them by now.’

“I remember one day, we were in a convertible,” she continued. “This kid just kept hanging on the side and I said, ‘We’re going to drive off, you’d better get off,’ and he said, ‘I can’t, my finger’s stuck in the door.’ ” Fortunately, Stan got the message before he gunned the car.

Gerry said she did not feel resentment about sharing her father’s time with the crowds. That was the deal. “You knew you had to share him, and that was okay, and once you got home he was Dad. You learned how to share, you had to.”

There is a famous story about Lil pushing a fan who had knocked her down, and Stan telling Lil not to shove his fans. Gerry has heard Lil’s more complete version.

“It was during World War II and she had silk stockings and they were really hard to get in those days,” Gerry said, alluding to the wartime shortages of luxuries like nylons. “The fans were running after him and one of them knocked her down. She got up and she had ripped her stockings, and she said, ‘You made me rip my stockings.’ ” Apparently Lil did give the fan a shove. What woman wouldn’t have?

Download

Copyright Disclaimer:
This site does not store any files on its server. We only index and link to content provided by other sites. Please contact the content providers to delete copyright contents if any and email us, we'll remove relevant links or contents immediately.