Tales from the Cubs Dugout Hardcover - 2000

From the publisher

Have so many ever cheered so much for so little? The Chicago Cubs last won the World Series in 1908 and last appeared in the Fall Classic the year World War II ended.Yet Cubs fans are among the most loyal, most knowledgeable, and most rabid in baseball. The teams they have loved and the players they have cherished have provided some of the game's finest moments, as well as a treasure trove of baseball lore. The Cubs' home park, Wrigley Field, is as much a national landmark as the Empire State Building or the Golden Gate Bridge. A charter member of the National League, the Cubs were born in 1876 -- the same year the Seventh Cavalry fought at Little Big Horn. Cap Anson, baseball's first superstar and possibly the finest player of the 19th century, played for early Cubs squads. In the early years of the 20th century, the fantastic double-play combination of Tinkers to Evers to Chance was immortalized in verse. Mordecai "Three Finger" Brown, Grover Cleveland Alexander, and Fergie Jenkins rank among baseball's greatest pitchers, while hitters Kiki Cuyler, Hack Wilson, Billy Herman, Ernie Banks, Billy Williams, and Sammy Sosa have put up amazing numbers. But the Cubs transcend baseball much the same way that Paris transcends Europe. The story of the Cubs is part legend, part pathos, often heroic, and, on occasion, hilarious.