Invincible Summer
Peter Schilling Jr.
For those of you not in the know, I'm writing a novel. It's called Invincible Summer, and it's the story of Bill Veeck, the P. T. Barnum of Baseball, and his attempt to integrate the Philadelphia Athletics in 1944. Since this never happened, it's a novel.
It's been a good long time since the few of you have actually read a book of mine, so I thought I'd include in this issue the first chapter of the rough draught of Invincible Summer. Here it is:
Chapter One: "The U.S.S. Excelsior"
Marine First Sergeant Bill Veeck stood at the bow of the U.S. transport ship Excelsior, trying to determine why the smell of blood always took him back to Wrigley Field. While the ship lumbered across the Pacific Ocean, Veeck stood on deck, smoking, thinking about that guy downstairs, clawing at the wounds in his gut, that sharp odor, and then…Wrigley. Considering that he'd seen action in Guadalcanal, Veeck found himself in Wrigley Field quite often. Maybe it was watching old Steth Phillips stitch up that ragged gash on Lefty Owens thigh, back when Veeck was a kid picking up towels in the Cubs locker room. Or that fight in the bleachers, a bad one, just because that kid was a Cards fan. Didn't matter, did it? During battle, it would calm him, he would breathe again in gasps, compose himself with the immediacy a marine needed in combat, and return fire or duck down into the mud. So baseball saved him, he thought. And it was while he was musing over this, while trying to forget the jungle and the loss of his right leg, while he was wondering where Lefty Owens and Steth Phillips ended up in life, that it occurred to Bill Veeck that he should buy the Philadelphia Athletics.
Veeck had been thinking about his return to baseball ever since he was discharged, but he hadn't given any specific team the nod. That night he wanted time to formulate a plan. He stood at the front of the ship, where there wasn't any setting sun, nothing but a wall of gray promising America in a few days. The rest of the men on deck were crowded at the stern, gazing wistfully at the wake and the setting sun and dreaming their dreams of home. Veeck wasn't concerned about the possibility of Japanese subs lurking in the lead-colored sea, or the sharks, and he didn't care to get hypnotized by the phosphorus in the wake, or search for the blue-bottle dolphins that meant good fortune. Smoking, he stood alone, his crutches leaning against the guardrail. He wore an artificial leg just below the right knee and was doing his best to ignore it. Now and again he'd sip coffee through the side of his mouth, then smoke, sip, and smoke, over and over like clockwork, every few seconds. On the deck by his left leg sat the four coffee cups waiting their turn. A man of tics, Veeck drank fast and didn't like to keep hobbling down to the mess for more. What he really wanted was a beer. Beer might just lift everyone's spirits, if you asked him. He lit another cigarette off the one he was smoking and squinted at the horizon.
Another marine joined him, a young man who took a spot at the railing and didn't say a word. Veeck caught a glance from the corner of his eye. The kid looked like he'd been through a meat grinder. He limped up to the rail and was missing his left arm. Funny, Veeck thought, he obviously wanted to be alone, away from the crowds, yet he parked himself right at my elbow. Veeck considered himself lucky—he'd lost only a leg.
After a moment of reflective silence, Veeck asked, "Coffee?" The marine thinned his eyes for a response, as if thinking it over. Veeck reached down—clumsily, for he was still unused to maneuvering with his new leg—and brought up two cups of coffee, still steaming. "There you go," he said, and lit up with a solid grin. The kid's face softened ever so slightly. He took the cup and stared into it as if the answers to his troubles lay at the bottom.
Veeck slurped his coffee and bellowed out smoke in great blasts, all the while smiling. He almost always smiled, with a grin as wide as the open collars he wore in defiance against a world of ties. Sporting a marine-issue buzz cut, which brought out the blonde in his thinning red hair, Veeck had the look of a blue-collar man. He had a face weathered from constant sun and a voice scratched from having to shout over the clatter of the El trains of his hometown Chicago.
He introduced himself. In response, the marine mumbled, "Kelly," and then stared ahead. After a moment, Veeck reached down and knocked on his own shin. "Wood," he said. "Recoil from a 50mm. Smashed my ankle to pieces. Got infected. So I'm in for eighteen months and it's out on my ear. You?"
All he got was a shrug and a single word: "Grenade."
"Grenade," Veeck said, quietly, and tried to gauge how far to take his questions. Not too far, from the looks of things. "Where you from, Kelly?"
"Philadelphia."
"No kidding?" Veeck took this as a sign of good fortune, offered Kelly a cigarette, which he took with a thankful nod. "OK, friend, which is it? A's or Phils?"
That got him. Kelly chuckled and shook his head, as if something had been revealed to him again. "Oh, Jesus Christ, the A's."
"Of course, of course," Veeck said. "But they've been in the tank a long time, Kelly."
The marine took a long, slow pull off his cigarette, blew smoke and said, "Since '31. Old Connie Mack never kept ‘em good for long."
"Don't know how much you've heard, but let me tell you, baseball's just not fun anymore. Say, Kelly, when did you enlist?"
"Right after Pearl."
"So you missed it. But you must have read about the situation in Stars and Stripes, in The Sporting News. Baseball's in rough shape. Since Pearl, it's all dried up. No one left to play. You have these flatfoots out there, old men and nobodies swinging at everything. 4-F teams. Now you'd think the Aging Powers would try to liven it up some, wouldn't you? Here you have millions of people with money for the first time in almost twenty years and guess where they're not spending it?" Kelly didn't answer. "At the ballpark, right?" Encouraged by a slow nod, Veeck continued, leaning in closely. "Listen," he said, "I'm going to change that. Would you believe me if I told you that I'm going to buy the A's?"
At this, Kelly turned his weary eyes to the sea and let out a deep, irritated sigh. He was tired. Tired of brooding about his future, tired of crying over his missing left arm, tired of the whole mess. "OK," he said at last. "I'm blue. Let's hear it."
"Great! I'll give you the whole ten chapters," Veeck said. Tossing his empty cup overboard, he started from the beginning:
William Veeck Jr. grew up in the dusty corridors of Wrigley Field, where his father, the stoic William Veeck Sr., served as president of the Chicago Cubs back in the 1930s. The senior Veeck taught his son everything about baseball, and while young Bill eschewed the suits and ties of his father, he kept the lessons close to his heart. The elder Mr. Veeck was an innovator, a man who knew that you needed to build a winning team and provide some fun. He proposed interleague games, started Ladies' Day, and was the first to broadcast the games on the radio. "Bill", he told his son one day while they counted the day's receipts, "Take a good look at that money. It looks exactly the same. You can't tell who put it into your box office. It's the same color, the same size and the same shape. Don't ever forget that."
Veeck didn't forget. As a teenager, he knocked around the bleachers and grandstands, sanding down the seats to keep them smooth from splinters, and lugged hot dog carts through the crowds. He listened to the tired men and women who endured the depression and came to watch the games after work—or in lieu of work, when no jobs could be found. Nothing pleased him more than listening to the strategies of the fans who spent their afternoons in the cheap seats. These people spent their time and money on the Cubs, when money was scarce and those hours could be used to raise a few dimes just to feed your family. He never forgot that, either.
After a few years working with the Cubs, from the bleachers to the front office, he decided the time was right to run his own team. He rounded up a group of skeptical investors who felt compelled by their relationship to his father to usher the son onto the path to his first failure. After one of his squirrely pitch sessions, they wondered, how this nut could be William Veeck's son? It was as if a banana sprouted from the branch of an apple tree. They figured that a quick failure would kick him in the pants and hopefully right out of the sport. So Veeck bought the Milwaukee Brewers, a sorry minor league team that hadn't operated in the black since before the depression. He cleaned up rickety Borchert Field, made a variety of shrewd trades, and in the course of two seasons took that moth-eaten franchise from last place to a pennant winner. With his crazy promotions and a winning ballclub, over a million fans showed up, easily more than any minor league club in America, more even than all but two of the big league teams. His investors nearly had coronaries from the news, but the money made them happy. Veeck's success continued for three years until he grew bored and joined the Marines. He was shipped to Guadalcanal and spent fourteen of his eighteen months of service in military hospitals. Finally, they took his leg off and discharged him.
"So I'm 32 years old and bored to tears," he continued, gripping a transfixed Kelly on the shoulder. "I've been in baseball since I was three, standing by my Daddy and watching him ply his trade. Let me ask you this." His voice dropped. "Out there," he nodded behind him, "when things got touchy, in those moments when everything's going to hell, baseball's comforting, isn't it?"
Kelly nodded slowly. "Yes, it is," he said. Veeck was about to speak, but Kelly went on. "Like this friend of mine, Casey. God, all he could talk about was the Browns. How they were going to win a pennant someday. We'd get to arguing about… that guy, he…" Suddenly, Kelly broke into a nervous smile. "Go on, tell me more."
"Sure, kid. Listen: you can't ask for a better audience than you have today. But who wants to root for a team that isn't even decent, and baseball so grim and serious you can't help but get bored?"
"You must have some decent money to buy a ballclub."
"Truth is, Kelly, I'm nearly busted." Veeck dug his hand into his pocket and pulled out a wad of small bills. "About fifty bucks. I have a thousand in the bank and my family's camped out at a ranch in Arizona that I'll be able to sell at a tremendous loss. Other than that, nothing. Zip. Zero. Zilch. But you don't need much capital to buy a club. Just a stable of investors at your disposal and a bank that isn't afraid to back you up. Money's not a problem. Problem is, the A's are so bad and there are so few players available that the chances of building a winning club are remote for quite a few years. Which means little profit." He pulled a scrap of paper out of his shirt. "But you can promote. Get people in who're starving for fun, and that's what makes the money tree grow. Kelly, let me try some of my ideas out on you. Opening day: a parade."
"A parade?"
"That's right! Imagine white elephants stomping down Lehigh Avenue, with the opening day pitcher on its back, Rajah-style! Behind him, here come the A's, brandishing bats over their shoulders like rifles! Then you'd have clowns, dozens of clowns, dressed like A's, packed into those tiny cars, scooting around. Three marching bands from the local schools. War bond drives. Thousands of fans lining the streets."
Kelly smiled. "Christ, that'd be fun. Connie Mack never had a parade."
"Mr. Mack is a good man, but very, very serious." Veeck looked around conspiratorially and whispered, "Get this: midgets."
Kelly gasped by way of a laugh. "What do you mean?"
"Midgets! I'm going to sign nine midgets! As ballplayers. Very secretive. First away game, we get a lineup of shorties. Who can pitch to a midget? They're so small, you'd have walk after walk after walk. Imagine midgets circling the bases. Amazing! Our half, you bring out the defensive substitutes—the real guys—and the game begins. With a sizeable lead, of course."
"That doesn't sound very fair," Kelly said, chuckling.
"Forget about that. I'll paint the ball red, white and blue. We'll have breakfast games for the third shift crowd and sell pancakes in the stands. Ushers in pajamas. Fireworks after every game. You like fireworks?"
"I love fireworks. But with the blackouts—"
"And prizes every day. With the lucky ticket, you win… what? Meat? With the rationing, everyone could use ten pounds of chuck. Get the girls in, ladies night free. Give away silk stockings. Orchids."
"You'd really have midgets?"
"What would be great is if I could pull a Satchel Paige and have the outfielders take off their gloves and sit while Satch strikes out the side."
Kelly looked stunned. "What? How's that?"
"You heard me." Veeck couldn't help but laugh. "Old Satch guaranteed the first nine men out, the last three on strikes. Other times he'd intentionally loaded the bases then strike out the side. He'd—"
"All of the fielders would sit down? Without their gloves on?"
"That's right. Old Satch—"
"Who?"
"Satchel Paige."
"Jesus, why don't you sign that guy?"
Veeck laughed. "Well— Well, he's…" He fell mute.
Kelly waited eagerly for the answer. "He in the service?"
"No. He's… he's hard to find." Veeck's mind raced. Satchel Paige, he thought. Throwing that bee ball against the American League, they wouldn't know what hit them. And what about Josh Gibson? Lineups began to fill his head. Willie Wells, and…
Bill Veeck was about to buy a major league team. There was nothing in their myriad of rules that said he couldn't sign Negroes to play baseball. Nothing on the books, just a gentleman's agreement. No one ever accused Bill Veeck of being a gentleman. He chewed his lips and blinked to keep his eyes from burning. Kelly asked him a question he didn't hear. Veeck thought: with Satchel and Josh and Buck and Ray Dandridge, they'd break every record in the book. Veeck thought: it would be the greatest lineup baseball had ever seen. Veeck thought: I'm going to make baseball history, and I'm going to haul in the greatest crowds in anyone has ever seen. He'd make a mint. Landis couldn't stop him, could he? That's what we're fighting for, isn't it?
"Hey, mister, what did you say your name was—"
"Kid," he interrupted, "Satchel Paige is the greatest pitcher in the world. Know what? I'm going to sign him as soon as I get back."
"Why didn't anyone sign him before?"
For the first time, Veeck stared Kelly right in the eyes. "Well, Kelly, because Satchel's a Negro." He let it sink in for a moment, before adding, "he's in the Negro Leagues." Kelly laughed. Veeck laughed with him, nodding the whole time. "And, Kelly, I've got you to thank! Holy cats, we're gonna change the world! Think of how much fun everyone'll have!"
"Fun, sure." Kelly's smile dropped ever so slightly. "A Negro?"
Veeck repeated: "Old Satch is the greatest pitcher I've ever seen. Kelly, the Negro Leagues are full of great players, just waiting to be plucked like grapefruit. There's dozens of ‘em, hungry to play. The finest ballplayers in the world! So we won't just have fun, my friend, we'll take the pennant as well! We'll bring the championship flag back to Philly! What do you think about that!"
"But, you…" Kelly stopped abruptly. He reached down slowly and set his coffee cup on the deck. When he stood up his face was hard. "You're a son of a bitch," he said. He looked like he was going to choke on his words. "God damn you…" Kelly opened his mouth to speak, but it was as if the words were choking him. "What I been through—"
"Wait a minute… listen—"
Kelly spat in Veeck's face. Then he walked away.
A sharp wind whipped the signal flags around, snapping them in the darkening sky. Bill Veeck pulled a handkerchief from his pocket and wiped his face. He tried to compose himself by lighting a cigarette, but his matches kept blowing out. Now his stump began to ache. Veeck looked out at the horizon, to a single bright star shining in the east. The Excelsior leaned to the starboard side and Veeck gripped the guardrail to keep from falling over. Another marine walked up, cheery, without injury, and said, "Hiya, mac! Gotta smoke?"
Veeck ignored him, and made his way down to the hatch leading to his bunk.
"Hey!" the marine yelled. "Sometin' eatin' ya? Where ya going?"
"I don't know, yet," Veeck said. "I just don't know."
 Loafer's #4, August 1995
Back side of the magazine that goes in either direction. Pig latin table of contents; letter from Philip Morris, John Eric Lund wants us to stop using pseudonyms, Mr. Pennard D. Draught on learning email; Eric Goodell meets "Carol at the Party"; Steve Willis' Morty the Dog goes hitchhiking; the Mark Masini transcripts (very small); How Peter Schilling Jr. spends his Saturday mornings; John Schilling's upset stomach; Karin Fodness meets the perverted dentist; more! Cover or happy prisoner by John Schilling, who says "In the future, everyone will spend at least fifteen minutes in jail."
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