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Long Beach gets its share of the Ruth spotlight based on some deft digging by Leavy, who produced more than 600 pages of work for this tome.\u00a0While in Southern California recently to talk about the project, Leavy shared more about Ruth\u2019s celebrity-induced visits to Long Beach\u00a0and even exhumed more information in trying to be as historically accurate as possible about just who, what, where, when and how some of these things came about.<\/p>\n
First off: Whatever Ruth may or may not have done that was considered egregious, he was already trying to live down something that Yankees general manager Ed Barrow called the \u201conly dumb play\u201d of his baseball career.<\/p>\n
There are two out in the bottom of the ninth inning of Game 7 of the 1926 World Series, against the Cardinals, at Yankee Stadium.\u00a0Ruth, who already hit a solo homer in the third inning to give the Yankees a 1-0 lead, is up, and draws a walk, the fourth given to him in the game. But then he tries to steal second base. He’s thrown out.\u00a0Game over. Series over. From a hero of Game 4, with his record-setting, three home run game, to goat, before anyone ever decided that G.O.A.T meant \u201cGreatest Of All Time.\u201d<\/p>\n
Time to make some money<\/strong><\/p>\n Late in October of \u201926, Ruth starts a 12-week, 14-city tour of the Midwest and California, performing with the Pantages vaudeville theater chain, often making as much if not more from these appearances than he would make from his Yankees\u2019 salary.<\/p>\n The final performance was to circle around to Long Beach on Jan. 21, 1927. The show would follow a format that had worked before: there was newsreel highlights projected onto a large sheet showing Ruth\u2019s on-the-field exploits, he would come bursting through the sheet, the audience would erupt, he\u2019d start talking about himself, tell stories, perhaps do a song and dance. It ended when he would invite a half-dozen kids up to have them recite a poem or do a cute performance. Then he would send them off with autographed baseballs.<\/p>\n There were three performances that day in Long Beach, the last an afternoon matinee. Yet, the restless Ruth somehow decided he wanted to go fishing in between.<\/p>\n That could be arranged. In steps Glenn E. Thomas, owner of the largest Studebaker dealership in Long Beach, also a city councilman and early investor in Hancock Oil, and someone who knew how public relations works.<\/p>\n And yes, it\u2019s the same Glenn E. Thomas whose name resonates with car dealerships over the Long Beach, Signal Hill and Huntington Beach areas. Thomas sends him to a dealership in Riverside owned by his brother, Clare. The plan was to shoot some publicity photos, invite a local automobile reporter from the Riverside Enterprise<\/em>, then they\u2019d all go to the Rainbow Angling Club in San Bernardino.<\/p>\n As the story goes, by the time Clare Thomas and the reporter met up with Ruth after the shoot, Ruth had already caught, cleaned and ate<\/em> 17 trout, washing it down with … you know.\u00a0But that was only half the problem. Ruth realized it was getting late and there was no way he could drive back to Long Beach \u201ceven in a Glenn E. Thomas Studebaker,\u201d Leavy writes.<\/p>\n The answer was to hire a local daredevil pilot who would charge them $20\u2014well above the usual $2.50 fee\u2014to make the 35-minute flight from San Bernardino to Long Beach. Just one problem: The guy\u2019s plane had some fuselage issues. So as Ruth poured drinks for everyone on the running board of their Studebaker, someone cut into squares some Pillsbury bags that had been used for dishcloths and patched things up.<\/p>\n So Ruth somehow gets back in time and in one piece. Leavy picks up the story: As Ruth is \u201cjuggling autographed baseballs\u201d backstage at the regal 1,800-seat State Theater waiting for the show to start, someone delivers the news \u2013 he\u2019s being served a warrant for his arrest on charges of \u201cviolating child labor laws\u201d during a theater performance in San Diego seven days earlier.<\/p>\n Ruth, still trying to sober up, reportedly says: \u201cI have never been so mad in my life.\u201d<\/p>\n A publicity-conscious deputy state labor commissioner named Stanley M. Gue drummed up charges that made Ruth responsible for an 8-year-old who already had the stage name of Baby Annette De Kirby being allowed to \u201cperform\u201d after the hour of 10 p.m. She was one of the kids who had come up and was part of Ruth\u2019s act.<\/p>\n \u201cIt was an unfair set-up,\u201d Leavy explains. \u201cStanley M. Gue was a socialist but a guy not beyond self-promotion. This kid was a child actor paraded around by her parents. She would later be in an \u2018Our Gang\u2019 comedy. That said, the whole suit was completely insane.\u201d<\/p>\n Ruth turned himself in at the Long Beach Police Station, was photographed, and posted $500 bail, \u201cdonning the baseball uniform he would wear for his act, but also in street shoes, and the same smelly argyle sweater he had worn to the Rainbow Angling Club.\u201d<\/p>\n Leavy also notes: \u201cThe jailhouse photographer whose picture appeared in newspapers all over the country was none other than the one employed by Glenn E. Thomas.\u201d<\/p>\n How to get out of a fix<\/strong><\/p>\n In today\u2019s world, TMZ would be all over it. In the newspaper world of the 1920s, there was time to perform some rehab and spin by his handler, sportswriter-turned-publicist Christy Walsh, who was always by Ruth\u2019s side.<\/p>\n \u201cSome people even thought Walsh made this whole thing up as a stunt,\u201d said Leavy. \u201cI don\u2019t believe that.\u201d<\/p>\n A trial date for The People of the State of California v. George Herman Ruth was set in Long Beach for Feb. 7\u2014which also happened to be Ruth\u2019s 33rd\u00a0birthday. Walsh could fix that.<\/p>\n First, a postponement. Next, Walsh created a diversion.<\/p>\n He had already been trying to get Ruth to save some money as a nest egg without much success. Walsh decided that Ruth was going to announce, on his birthday, that he \u201cwas penalizing himself a thousand dollars for each year of misbehavior\u201d and that would be put into a trust fund in New York.<\/p>\n Ruth not only bought in,\u00a0but he immediately put $33,000 into the \u201cpenalty\u201d account\u2014or $1,000 for each year of his existence.<\/p>\n \u201cNewspapers across the country trumpeted the news of a new era of fiscal responsibly,\u201d Leavy writes. It also stirred up national sportswriters to come to Ruth\u2019s defense. Damon Runyon decided that Ruth shouldn\u2019t have to penalize himself because he \u201cwas wildly underpaid\u201d by the Yankees. The team had just made him an offer of $52,000 deal, the same that he earned the previous three seasons, so the negations were played out in the press.<\/p>\n With all that commotion, and Ruth returning to Los Angeles to make a movie at the new Wrigley Field ballpark not far from the Coliseum, his case was finally heard on Feb. 25.<\/p>\n \u201cBy the time Ruth entrained, Justice Claude I. Chambers had released his six-page opinion,\u201d Leavy writes. Chambers declared: \u201cIf this case constitutes a violation of the law, then all my 30 years of the study of law have gotten away from me.\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n \u201cIt was once again safe to take American children to see Babe Ruth,\u201d Leavy declared.<\/p>\n \u201cThe claim this young girl was \u2018employed\u2019 was to say the least convenient,\u201d Leavy elaborated. \u201cBut it was guaranteed publicity for Gue.<\/p>\n \u201cThen of all things, Walsh protested about $200 in legal fees charged to Ruth, because Walsh was as cheap as the day was long. Eventually it came around to where the lawyers asked: You think you can get us some autographed baseballs instead?\u2019\u201d<\/p>\n By the time the May 1927 issue of \u201cStudebaker Wheel\u201d magazine came out, chronicling that crazy fishing trip, Leavy surmised \u201cRuth probably hadn\u2019t seen the story.\u201d Or cared.<\/p>\n![\"\"](\"https:\/\/lbpost.com\/wp-content\/uploads\/2018\/11\/originaltheatersite-970x700.jpg\")
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