UP FRONT

GARY ROSENBLATT

Editor

A Summertime Pilgrimage
To Cooperstown And Memories

Long before
W.P. Kinsella
wrote his lyric
novel, Shoeless
which
Joe,
became the
movie, Field Of
Dreams, base-
ball was about fathers and
sons.
I sensed that connection
most strongly when I toured
the Baseball Hall of Fame in
Cooperstown, New York re-
cently with my two sons, ages
9 and 17, at my side — and
felt the presence of my late
father, a gentle rabbi who was
also a rabid Dodger fan from
his early childhood days in
Brooklyn.
More a pilgrimage than a
visit, a trip to Cooperstown
for any baseball fan is a step
over the threshold of nostal-
gia, a chance to feel like a kid
again and relive long forgot-
ten moments.
Even the setting is ideal.
Cooperstown is a pictur-
esque village of about 2,000
people, nestled in the hills of
upstate New York, far from
any major metropolis.
Binghamton, New York,
about an hour's highway
drive southwest, is the

closest city of size. But more
than 600,000 people a year
make the trek, with love of
baseball the prime motiva-
tion.
The Hall of Fame is a
modest brick building whose
exhibits attempt to bridge
the span of time and age.
Older fans may linger over
the plaques of the elite
membership or the section
on the more unusual
ballparks and stadiums
around the major leagues,
including a replica of Eb-
betts Field, the exotic little
bandbox where the Dodgers
played. (I recall as a nine-
year-old seeing a game be-
tween the Dodgers and their
arch-rivals, the Giants, and
marveling at how close we
were to the field and at the
proliferation of poles, seem-
ingly obstructing the view of
half those in attendance.)
Youngsters might best en-
j oy the computerized
screens where a touch of a
button brings to life the
stats, biography and filmed
highlights of virtually every
player in the Hall.
Curiously, though, my
younger son said he best en-
joyed the exhibit on the evo-

lution of bats, balls and
gloves used in the majors,
from the finger-less, non-
padded black glove worn in
the early 1900s to the sleek
mitts used today.
Looking through the glass
at the oversized catcher's
mitt Paul Richards designed
to help poor Gus Triandos
have a better chance of
catching a Hoyt Wilhelm
floating knuckleball, I
couldn't help recall my first
glove, purchased as my Afi-
komen present the Passover
that I was eight years old, a
way-too-big left-handed
fielder's glove signed by the
never-famous Grady
Hatton.
Such memories and con-
nections are to be expected
for anyone who grew up with
baseball an important part
of one's youth. I leave it to
Roger Angell or George Will
to wax eloquent about why
baseball stirs such emotions
in those of us who love the
game. Surely the fact that it
is the only major sport
where time is not a factor,
where the game is measured
by outs rather than minutes
or seconds, makes it so in-
furiating to those who do

NATIONAL BASEBALL

HALL of FAME
and MUSEUM
COOPERSTOWN, N.Y.

ADULT s 6.eo

not share a love for its
rhythms and nuances.
But that timelessness is
part of the attraction for me.
Listening to, or watching, a
baseball game provides an
opportunity for conversa-
tion, for fathers to explain
the subtleties of a hit-and-
run or squeeze play to an ea-
ger son or daughter.
My father and I some-
times had difficulty ver-
balizing our feelings for each
other, but baseball talk be-
tween us always came easi-
ly. So do memories of listen-
ing together to a Dodger
game at night on the radio,
discussing strategy, like
when to pull a struggling
Don Newcombe.
Walking up to the top
floor of the three-story Hall,
I was picturing Don
Zimmer's baseball card —
one cheek full of tobacco —

07-2H-90

when I came upon a wall full
of baseball trading cards,
dating back to the 1890s,
when tobacco, not bubble
gum, was in each pack.
It struck me that if
mothers could comprehend
or appreciate the importance
of baseball cards to kids,
those old cards, some of
which are worth thousands
of dollars today, would be
worthless. It was our
mothers who drove up the
prices by throwing out our
cigar boxes full of cards as
soon as we left home.
What surprised me most
at Cooperstown was not the
exhibits, though, but the
flood of memories that came
pouring through, seeing the
names of long-forgotten
players and recalling the cir-
cumstances surrounding
their playing days — and
mine.

ROUND UP

Casey Kasem
Spins A New Tune
Casey Kasem was playing
a new song last week when
he appeared on public televi-
sion's "McNeil-Lehrer
Report."
When Mr. Kasem came in
November to his hometown
of Detroit, he brought
together 50 local Jews and
Arabs to foster peace in the
Middle East. But peace was
far from the "American Top
40" radio host's mind when
he appeared on a panel with
two Iraqi-born Detroiters
and another Arab American.
Each time Mr. Kasem was
on camera during the
discussion of Iraq's invasion
of Kuwait, he turned the
subject to Israel. He accused
the United States of being
self-serving because it is us-
ing force against Iraq, but
refused to use force against
Israel during the 1982 inva-
sion of Lebanon.
Mr. Kasem also listed
alleged Israeli abuses of Pa-
lestinians during the in-
tifada, citing unnamed
Swedish reports and Amnes-

ty International as his
sources.
Mr. Kasem is of Lebanese
Druze extraction and has
participated in more than 20
Arab-Jewish dialogues since
1986.

HUC Opens
Spinoza Library
Jerusalem — The
Jerusalem campus of the
Hebrew Union College-
Jewish Institute of Religion
has opened a new library
featuring the world's largest
collection of works related to
the Dutch philosopher
Baruch Spinoza, as well as
Judaica and Hebraica.
The library will include
100,000 volumes, including
the biblical archaeology
library of the late Professor
Yigal Yadin.
The Spinoza Collection
contains works by Spinoza
and his followers, dating
from 1665-1832. Included
are rare editions of his Trac-
tatus Theologico-Politicus,
an attack on religion which
had to be printed with a false

title page because of prohibi-
tions placed on the book's
sale. The collection also in-
cludes anti-Spinoza writings
and the Utrecht Ordinance
of 1679, which prohibits the
sale and distribution of
Spinoza's works.
Spinoza was excom-
municated in 1656 because
of his radical views on
Judaism.

The Handwriting
Is On The Wall
Tel Aviv (JTA) — A hand-
writing expert who has
analyzed the penmanship of
President Saddam Hussein
has determined that the Ira-
qi leader is a dangerous
lunatic who ought to be
committed.
The Israeli graphologist,
who reportedly did not know
to whom the writing sample
belonged, examined the Ira-
qi leader's script on behalf of
Mossad, the Israeli intel-
ligence agency.
Last week the Israeli daily
Yediot Achronot said Mossad
sent the graphologist's

Saddam Hussein:
The writing of a madman.

report to policy makers in
Jerusalem.
According to Yediot
Achronot, the expert said,
"This man must be com-
mitted immediately.
"He makes decisions
quickly, tends toward ex-
treme moods, is willing to
take extreme decisions and
implement them, (has) a
tendency toward violence
and is dangerous to society."

Soviet Jews
Attend Camps
Lishkas Ezras Achim, an
affiliate of Lubavitch, is this
summer operating 10 camps
for Jewish children
throughout the Soviet
Union. More than 1,500
students aged 8-23 are stu-
dying Hebrew, Jewish re-
ligion and history in Kiev,
Leningrad, Napoprotovsk
and other Soviet cities.
Ezras Achim, which is
based in New York, has been
working for 27 years on
behalf of Soviet Jewry.
The organization hosts two
camps: an overnight facility
and a day camp. In addition
to tapping into Soviet Jew-
ish talent to staff the camps,
50 counselors were flown in
from the United States and
Israel.
This is the third year
Ezras Achim has sponsored
camps for Soviet Jewish
youth.

Compiled by
Elizabeth Applebaum

THE DETROIT JEWISH NEWS

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