100 Things Cubs Fans Should Know & Do Before They Die (30 page)

96. The Emil Verban Memorial Society

On January 1, 2010, Bruce Ladd Jr., a retired Washington D.C. lobbyist, mailed out a newsletter to the 700 members of the world’s most renowned Cubs fan club. The purpose was to let the members know he was shutting it down.

And so the Emil Verban Memorial Society ended just as it began, on the sole whim of its founder.

Retired and living in North Carolina, Ladd said he dreamed up the Verban Society in 1975 as a way to gain access to politicians and members of the media, many of whom he knew to be rabid Cubs fans. Among the first to join was former Vice President Dick Cheney, also known as Society member No. 4.

There were never any rules, responsibilities or, perhaps most importantly, dues to be paid. At first, you had to live in the D.C. area, but as the club grew in notoriety, its borders were expanded.

Before he knew it, the Emil Verban Memorial Society took on a life of its own. Ladd cut off membership at 700 in the mid
–1980s after President Reagan, a former Cubs broadcaster, gave the Emil Verban Society—and Ladd—the kind of publicity one can only dream about.

“You’re looking for an edge,” Ladd said. “This was an edge. It always amazed [me that] nobody else did it.”

By 1980, after five years of doing nothing but existing, Ladd decided to hold what became a Verban Society biennial lunch, and some awards were even given out from time to time. For example, the Ernie Banks Positivism Trophy was once won by Reagan.

On the other side, the Brock-for-Broglio Judgment Award—given to a person who shows the lousiest judgment—was awarded to the CEO of Coca-Cola for creating New Coke and to Rafael Palmeiro for having taken steroids.

Over the years, Democrats joined, as well. Hillary Clinton became a proud member, and White Sox fan Barack Obama became a not-so-proud member who joined against his will shortly after becoming president.

Obama had been nominated by another member, which was the only criteria for entrance. Once you’re in, it’s impossible to quit, unless of course Ladd decides it’s time for you to go.

Disgraced Illinois governors George Ryan and Rod Blagojevich both were Verban members, although Ryan was able to stay in good standing despite going to prison while Blagojevich was given the boot after being kicked out of office.

“There’s a difference between regular, normal Illinois graft and being an idiot,” Ladd explained.

So who the heck was Emil Verban? As far as baseball historians are concerned, he was a hard-working yet weak-hitting second baseman whose seven-year career, which ended in 1950, is most notable for the lone home run he hit in 2,911 career at-bats.

Verban only played 199 games with the Cubs during three seasons, but when Ladd was thinking about who to name his Society after, he knew he’d found his man. He felt Verban’s lunch-pail demeanor and Midwestern-style personality perfectly epitomized Cubs fans.

When Verban, who died in 1989, first heard about the Society, he thought he was being ridiculed and being made the butt of a joke. Ladd reached out to him and put an end to that notion and soon Verban grew to embrace the Society, often joining members for their biennial luncheon.

Verban became a mini-celebrity thanks to Ladd, who used his contacts to get Verban into old-timers games in Washington and even earned him an audience with President Reagan in the oval office. That’s why Ladd decided it had to end rather than let the Verban name be misused.

“It was an interesting life experience, and I’m glad it happened,” Ladd said. “And I’m glad I don’t have to spend any time on it anymore.”

97. Don Cardwell’s No-Hit Debut

Don Cardwell wasn’t happy at all, not one little bit. The 24-year-old right-handed pitcher had just been traded from the Philadelphia Phillies to the Chicago Cubs, and he wasn’t feeling the love.

“Being traded makes you feel as if you aren’t wanted,” he lamented to reporters.

Less than 48 hours later, Cardwell made Cubs history and felt wanted. Maybe too wanted.

With the help of several defensive gems, including a miraculous shoestring catch by left fielder Walt Moryn to secure the final out, Cardwell thrilled a Wrigley Field crowd of 33,543 by throwing a no-hitter against the St. Louis Cardinals in his Cubs debut on May 15, 1960.

Moryn’s grab ended a contest that only lasted one hour and 46 minutes, but being the back end of a doubleheader, restless fans immediately began pouring onto the field, clamoring for a piece of Cardwell. The ushers tried in vain to maintain order, but it was hopeless. Fans besieged Cardwell, who would later need a police escort to get back to his hotel, still carrying a Phillies bag with his clothes stuffed inside.

Afterward, he told the
Chicago Tribune
: “While all the fans were crowding around me, they kept beating my shoulder and pulling on my arm like they wanted a souvenir…me!”

Cardwell didn’t have much of a track record when the Cubs got him. In four seasons with the Phillies he went 17–26 with a 4.46 ERA while mainly working as a starter. However, Cubs General Manager John Holland said Cardwell was the key to the four-player deal that also brought over first baseman Ed Bouchee and sent backup catcher Cal Neeman and second baseman Tony Taylor to the Phillies.

Cardwell had been pitching well of late and in his previous start against the Los Angeles Dodgers had a no-hitter going through six innings. But he also walked six and didn’t factor in the decision. Against the Cardinals, he was a little wild at the outset. He walked the second batter he faced, shortstop Alex Grammas, before getting out of the first inning. Grammas was the final hitter Cardwell allowed to reach base.

He blew through the next six innings and arrived at the top of the eighth with history beckoning. Cardwell was well aware he had a no-hitter going, not because his teammates mentioned it to him or because he was scoreboard watching but because some excited kids apparently didn’t know the unwritten rule that you don’t talk to a pitcher in the midst of a no-hitter.

“A couple of kids [at the] back of the dugout kept telling me how many men I had retired in a row and how many I had to go,” he said.

So much for jinxes.

A couple of nice defensive plays in the eighth inning by Jerry Kindall and Bouchee, who also came over from the Phillies with Cardwell and went a quiet 0-for
-4 in his Cubs debut, preceded Cardinals legend Stan Musial coming to the plate as a pinch-hitter. A little over a year earlier, Musial had broken up Glen Hobbie’s no-hitter in the seventh inning, the only hit the Cardinals would get in a 1–0 Cubs victory. This time he struck out on four pitches.

In the ninth, Joe Cunningham’s line drive to Moryn nearly gave WGN’s Jack Brickhouse a heart attack. Brickhouse, who was always part fan and part broadcaster, screamed out, “Come on, Moose!” as the ball hovered above the outfield grass.

Moose got it, Brickhouse survived, and Cardwell got his no-hitter as well as a $2,000 raise a few days later from Cubs owner P.K. Wrigley.

And Cubs fans? They got their money’s worth for just about the only time all season. This was a terrible team already well below .500, and the no-hitter turned out to be one of the few bright spots. The Cubs drew only 809,770 fans and ended up in seventh place with a 60–94 record.

Cardwell, who was 1–2 at the time of the trade, finished the season with an 8–14 mark in a Cubs uniform. Two years later, on October 17, 1962, he was traded to the Cardinals in a deal that brought the Cubs pitcher Lindy McDaniel, who also happened to be the pitcher on the losing end of Cardwell’s no-no.

98. Keep Loving Buck O’Neil

If there’s an unsung hero in Cubs history it’s Buck O’Neil, the great baseball man who had a hand in signing, nurturing, and coaching everyone from Ernie Banks to Billy Williams to Lou Brock to Lee Smith to Joe Carter.

O’Neil belongs to all of baseball, not just the Cubs. His support and passion for the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum endeared him to generations of fans, and his passing in 2006 at the ripe old age of 94 came far too soon.

There’s little doubt O’Neil would have been a big-league skipper if racism hadn’t kept baseball’s managerial ranks segregated until Frank Robinson became Cleveland’s manager in 1975. Still, he found a way to make his mark on baseball and Cubs in many ways.

It took six years after Jackie Robinson broke the color barrier in 1947 for the Cubs to bring an African American player to Wrigley Field, and both of them—Ernie Banks and Gene Baker—played for O’Neil when he managed the Kansas City Monarchs of the Negro Leagues.

In late 1955, with the big leagues having driven the Negro Leagues out of business thanks to integration, the Cubs hired O’Neil as a scout and he remained employed by the club for more than two decades.

A short time after signing Williams, O’Neil got a call from the Cubs that the very promising young player had gone back home to Alabama, fed up and disgusted with being called “nigger” every time he took the field.

O’Neil arrived in Williams’ hometown of Whistler and sized up the situation. Instead of lecturing Williams to consider his future or how he needed to dismiss the bigots, the pair instead went out for some dinner and O’Neil didn’t once mention returning to his minor league club.

After dinner O’Neil took Williams out to a semi-pro game where other kids were playing, laughing, and enjoying the game of baseball. How they wished they could trade places with Williams. A day later, Williams went back to Texas to join his teammates. And 426 homers later, he entered the Baseball Hall of Fame.

Buck O’Neil talks about the Negro League on Sunday, July 30, 2006, at
the Baseball Hall of Fame Induction in Cooperstown, New York. (AP Photo/
Jim McKnight)

Of course, O’Neil was no stranger to racism in baseball. The Cubs helped temper that somewhat in 1962 when they made O’Neil the first African American coach in baseball history, a milestone that opened doors but also led to one enormous wasted opportunity.

When O’Neil was hired the Cubs were using the absurd College of Coaches system in which a rotating group of coaches would take turns running the club as the head coach. Despite being on staff, O’Neil wasn’t offered the same opportunity. Cubs general manager John Holland said O’Neil would not be part of the rotation, and his title would be “instructor.”

One day when the Cubs were playing Houston, head coach Charlie Metro was ejected and third-base coach Elvin Tappe soon followed. The Cubs needed a new third-base coach, and the only option in the dugout was O’Neil.

“All of the guys, they thought, ‘Buck’s going to coach at third base now.’” O’Neil told Carrie Muskat in
Banks to Sandberg to Grace
. “But I was there on the bench. They got Fred Martin, who was the pitching coach, and brought him from the bullpen to coach, which left nobody down in the bullpen. All that just to keep me from coaching at third base, which was stupid.”

Williams also recalled that moment.

“I think it kind of made him feel bad, and of course the black players on the ballclub, they sensed that. It made you uncomfortable. It was a thing you couldn’t do anything about.”

But O’Neil didn’t dwell on disappointment, just like he didn’t dwell on not being elected to the Baseball Hall of Fame with other Negro League stars a few months before he died.

“Shed no tears for Buck,” he said. “No, no. Ol’ God’s been good to me. You can see that, don’t you? If I’m a Hall of Famer for you, that’s all I need. Just keep loving ol’ Buck.”

99. The Veeck Boys

There’s something missing from Bill Veeck Jr.’s Hall of Fame plaque. It fails to mention the Cubs a single time, a grave oversight for a man who was fond of saying, “I am the only human being ever raised in a ballpark.”

That ballpark was Wrigley Field, and the man who raised him was responsible for some of the greatest Cubs teams ever.

William Veeck Sr. was a well-liked sports columnist who wrote for the
Chicago American
under the pen name Bill Bailey. In 1917, after writing a series of pieces explaining what he would do if he ran the Cubs, owner William Wrigley offered him the chance to put his money where his mouth was and run the team. Veeck Sr. accepted.

The following season, the Cubs won the National League pennant, and before
Veeck Sr.’s
death in 1933 they had won pennants in 1929 and 1932. The Cubs also won in 1935 with a roster largely comprised of Veeck Sr.’s players, not to mention a manager, Charlie Grimm, whom he had hired.

During these years, Veeck Jr. began his lifelong love affair with not just baseball but baseball fans. By the time he was 10,
Veeck Jr.
was going to Wrigley Field on a daily basis with his father, and by 15 he was working in the ticket office and moved on to being a vendor, concession stand salesman, and member of the grounds crew.

The elder Veeck was beloved by his son and taught him to treat customers as you would someone you’d invite into your own home, a lesson he never forgot while owning the St. Louis Browns, Cleveland Indians and, on two separate occasions, the Chicago White Sox.

When his father died of leukemia in 1933, Veeck Jr. was on his own and went to Cubs owner P.K. Wrigley, who had just inherited the team from his father, and asked for a job. He was hired for $18 a week as an office boy.

“My father left me a far more valuable and lasting legacy than money,” Veeck Jr. wrote in his autobiography
Veeck—
As In Wreck
. “He left me a good name. All my life I have run across old friends of his eager to show their affection for him by helping his son.”

Within a few years, Veeck was named treasurer of the Cubs, and he began to have a hand in projects that still define the franchise. In 1937, he oversaw the building of the bleachers, designed the current scoreboard, and even planted the ivy that grows each spring on the outfield walls.

Veeck Jr. was always ahead of his time. He tried and failed to get Wrigley to install lights at Wrigley Field, and a few years before the “W” or “L” flags started waving atop the scoreboard to alert residents and passengers on the “L” riding by, Veeck was permitted to install lights that would serve the same purpose the flags later would. Those lights were originally green for a win and red for a loss, but they’re now white for a win and blue if the Cubs go down to defeat.

Years after he last drew a paycheck from the Cubs, Bill Veeck Jr. could still be found with his wife and companion, Mary Frances, enjoying the sunshine in the bleachers he helped build and surrounded by the bittersweet ivy he helped plant.

There will never be another quite like Bill Veeck. Either one of them.