Clemente: The Passion and Grace of Baseball's Last Hero (57 page)

Along with the documentary record, scores of individuals were interviewed for this book. They include: Vera Clemente, Roberto Clemente Jr., Luis Clemente, Matino Clemente, Osvaldo Gil, Caguitas Colón, Vic Power (Victor Pellot), Juan Pizarro, Luis Olmo, Enrique Zorrilla, Diana Zorrilla, Rosa Semprit, Fernando González, Orlando Cepeda, Tony Taylor, Eduardo Valero, Ramiro Martínez, Roy McHugh, Myron Cope, Bill Nunn Jr., George Kiseda, Joe L. Brown, Steve Blass, Richie Hebner, Al Oliver, Bob Veale, Donn Clendenon, Nelson Briles, José Pagán, Don Leppert, Tony Bartirome, Les Banos, Chuck Goggin, Gene Garber, Harding Peterson, Bob Friend, Dick Schofield, Nick Koback, Gene Freese, Ferguson Jenkins, Juan Marichal, Earl Weaver, Paul Blair, Sparky Anderson, Gaylord Perry, Monte Irvin, Don Zimmer, Preston Pearson, Joan Whitman, Chico Fernández, Glenn Cox, Len Harsh, John Yarborough, Pat McCutcheon, Ann Ranalli King, Bruce Laurie, Howard Fineman, Juliet Schor, Richard Santry, Richard Moss, Carolyn Rauch, Squire Galbreath, Carol Bass, Anthony Jilek, Maurice J. Williams, Frederick Zugibe, Hart Achenbach, Nancy Golding, Jorge Carbonell, Nestor Barretto, Bernard Heller, John Heller, Bev Couric, Chico Azocar, Juanita Modale, Stuart Speiser, Jon Hoffman, Gary Czabot, John Parker, Mike Pangia, Vincent Bogucki, Paul Kutch, Chuck Tomasco, Duane Rieder, Eliezer Rodriguez, George Shamoon, and Rex Bradley.

1: SOMETHING THAT NEVER ENDS

It was long past midnight
:
Ints. Osvaldo Gil, Vera Clemente, Juan Pizarro.

In one bad dream
:
Int. Vera Clemente. During their years together, Roberto and Vera often talked about dreams, and decades later she could remember the discussions vividly, as well as some of her own long-ago dreams, including one about the monkey they brought back from Nicaragua.

So much had happened since Gil
:
Int. Osvaldo Gil.

Martín the Crazy is not that crazy
:
Int. Matino Clemente.

Not only Clemente and his ballplayers
: La Prensa,
November 10, 1972; Program, XX Campeonato Mundial de Béisbol Aficionado.

Hughes occupied the entire
:
Glenn Garvin,
Reason,
March 2000; Jay Mallin,
The Great Managua Earthquake,
Broadway: New York, 1972; Drosnin,
Citizen Hughes,
Henry Holt: New York, 1985; ints. Osvaldo Gil, Vic Power.

On the fifteenth
:
Int. Osvaldo Gil; UPI, November 15, 1972;
Novedades,
November 16, 1972;
La Prensa,
November 16, 1972. The
Novedades
account read as though Somoza’s publicist had written it, which was essentially the case: “Thousands of Nicaraguans saw once more General Somoza surrounded in the middle of his people, confirming with his presence the love that the public has for him . . .”

Clemente took to the people
:
Ints. Vera Clemente, Vic Power, Osvaldo Gil;
Do You Remember?
Clemente in Nicaragua with San Juan Senators in 1964, Edgard Tijerino,
La Prensa.
Tijerino wrote of the San Juan team that year: “The lineup that Puerto Rico presented could not be more impressive: Horace Clarke on second, José Pagán at short, Clemente in right field, Julio LaBoy and Orlando Cepeda alternating in left, Reynaldo Oliver and Marical Allen patrolling center . . . and a strong staff headed by Juan Pizarro, Luis Arroyo, Palillo Santiago, and Warren Hacker.”

This trip went no better
: San Juan Star,
November 16–30, 1972; ints. Vic Power, Osvaldo Gil.

With outfielder Julio César Roubert
:
Int. Osvaldo Gil.

His longtime friend from Puerto Rico
:
Int. Vic Power.

One morning, reading
La Prensa
: Ints. Osvaldo Gil, Vic Power; Edgard Tijerino,
La Prensa,
“Standing Up, Clemente Bats.”

Tijerino was now “oh for two”
:
Edgard Tijerino, The Last Interview; int. Osvaldo Gil.

There he met a wheelchair-bound
:
Ints. Osvaldo Gil, Vera Clemente.

One day in the old city
:
Int. Vera Clemente.

Clemente flew back to Puerto Rico
:
Ints. Vic Power, Osvaldo Gil, Vera Clemente.

All seemed well back home
:
Ints. Vera Clemente, Luis Clemente, Vic Power.

2: WHERE MOMEN CAME FROM

This was the summer of 1934
:
Ints. Matino Clemente, Vera Clemente.

The story has been told
:
Int. Vera Clemente.

Runaway slaves, known as cimarrones
: Este Silencio, Lydia Milagros González, Instituto Cultura Puertorriqueña, 1998;
Home: A Celebration of Roberto Clemente’s Spirit and Passion,
San Juan, 2003.

Sugar was then nearing the end
: Economic Existence, Sugar and Labor:
1928–1930s. 35th Annual Report of the governor of Puerto Rico;
Farr’s Manual of Sugar Companies.
Department of Labor 1934, Report on Sugar Industry.

By the standards of Depression-era Carolina
:
Ints. Matino Clemente, Vera Clemente.

Momen was his nickname
:
Int. Matino Clemente.

“When I was a little kid”
:
“A Conversation with Roberto Clemente,” Sam Nover, WIIC-TV, October 8, 1972. For all his confrontations with reporters, Clemente got along well with Nover. “Well, I tell you one thing, I tell you the truth, I don’t like lots of writers,” Clemente told Nover. “I think if I was a writer, one thing I would try to do is have a good relationship with the players. I never criticize a writer that I think is sincere in what he is writing. But a lot of these writers, they go to you, and they put the interview in a way that they sound like and you don’t exactly say that, see?”; Ints. Matino Clemente, Rosa Semprit.

Melchor was a regular figure
:
Ints. Matino Clemente, Orlando Cepeda, Vera Clemente, Rosa Semprit.

The Cangrejeros were grittier
:
Ints. Enrique Zorrilla, Juan Pizarro, Diana Zorrilla, Matino Clemente; Thomas E. Van Hyning,
The Santurce Crabbers.

Irvin said later that he enjoyed
:
Int. Monte Irvin.

When he could, Momen caught the bus
:
Conversation with Clemente; Ints. Matino Clemente, Juan Pizarro, Monte Irvin.

Cáceres developed a friendship
:
Cáceres,
Reader’s Digest,
July 1973.

Zorrilla scribbled the name
:
Ints. Enrique Zorrilla, Diana Zorrilla.

When Campanis filled out
:
Zorrilla family scrapbooks, Clemente family collection.

The Three Kings, in a sense
: Chicago Tribune, El Imparcial, San Juan Star, El Nuevo Día, Pittsburgh Courier, Sporting News;
Ints. Eduardo Valero, Ramiro Martínez, Osvaldo Gil, Luis Olmo, Vic Power.

Five major league teams expressed
:
Zorrilla family archives, Vera Clemente family scrapbooks; ints. Diana Zorrilla, Luis Olmo, Matino Clemente.

His first bats were variations
:
Hillerich & Bradsby records maintained by Rex Bradley.

3: DREAM OF DEEDS

Before Momen left home
:
Int. Matino Clemente. It was a family ritual every spring that his brothers Matino and Andres would drive Roberto to the airport for his flight to Florida.

It is hard to imagine
: Montreal Gazette,
Canadian Press dispatch, April 1, 1954.

Momen was the youngest player
: Montreal Gazette:
Int. Chico Fernández.

The International Baseball League lived up
: Montreal Gazette,
April 15, 1954, International League to Open with two New Teams April 20; Playing the Field, Dink Carroll,
Montreal Gazette,
April 20, 1954. Carroll wrote of the Sugar Kings: “The big name in Cuban baseball today is Roberto Maduro, president of the Sugar Kings. We met him at the Baseball Writers Dinner in New York in February and noted that he spoke English without any trace of an accent.” “I should.” He smiled. “I graduated from Cornell University.” Tom Meany,
Collier’s,
July 1954.

“made some sparkling”
:
Lou Miller,
Montreal Gazette,
May 1, 1954.

There was talk
:
The discussion began in New York and made its way to Montreal in a May 5 column by Dink Carroll. If Amoros made the club, Carroll wrote, “the Dodgers would have five Negroes in the lineup on a day that Don Newcombe or Joe Black was pitching. The suggestion was that this was one too many . . .”

The rooming house offered beds
:
Ints. Chico Fernández, Joan Whitman, Glenn Cox.

At night, Clemente would pour out
:
Int. Chico Fernández.

Havana was not home for Momen
:
Ints. Ramiro Martínez, Chico Fernández;
Montreal Gazette.

Andy High visited Montreal
: Montreal Gazette;
int. Chico Fernández.

Rickey sent Haak up to Montreal
:
Int. Howie Haak; Kevin Kerrane,
Dollar Sign on the Muscle;
ints. Chico Fernández, Glenn Cox.

Even the batboy
:
Ints. Don Zimmer, Orlando Cepeda; Zorrilla family archive.

Foreigners: make space
: Enrique Zorrilla, “Dream of Deeds”; Zorrilla family archives.

Mays was embraced joyously
:
Tom Meany, “Señor Mays Hit in San Juan,”
Collier’s,
January 7, 1955; Zorrilla family archive; int. Don Zimmer.

Clemente admired Mays
:
Ints. Orlando Cepeda, Enrique Zorrilla, Vic Power, Eduardo Valero, Monte Irvin, Luis Olmo; Zorrilla family archive.

At eleven on the Monday morning of November 22
:
Notice No. 29, Office of the Commissioner, October 29, 1954; C-41-54, National League of Professional Baseball Clubs, Warren C. Giles President, November 3, 1954; UP, November 22, 1954; UP November 23, 1954. “The Puerto Rican Negro batted only .257 in eighty-six games at Montreal last season, where he was used chiefly for defensive purposes, but impressed the Pirates and several other teams with his brilliant play this fall in the Puerto Rican winter league.”

Herman Franks’s lineup card
:
Ints. Don Zimmer, Orlando Cepeda, Enrique Zorrilla, Zorrilla family archives; Thomas E. Van Hyning,
The Santurce Crabbers.

When the road trip was over
:
Ints. Matino Clemente, Vera Clemente. Luis was a schoolteacher. His wife, Victoria Carrasquillo, was fearful of the operation and tried to talk him out of it. He was buried at the Cementerio Municipal de Rio Grande.

4: THE RESIDUE OF DESIGN

All of this was overseen by
:
Branch Rickey Papers, Manuscript Division, Library of Congress, Washington, D.C. (LCMD); Arthur Mann,
Branch Rickey, American in Action; Branch Rickey’s Little Blue Book;
Galbreath Collection, Darby Dan.

With aide-de-camp Blackburn
:
Memorandum of Game, January 18, 1955. Following Game in Havana, Cuba, Between Cienfuegos and Havana, Branch Rickey Papers, LCMD.

He kept his own scorecard
:
Ruben Gomez pitched that day, and Clemente was bracketed in the lineup by Don Zimmer batting second
and Buster Clarkson at cleanup. Harry Chiti was behind the plate. Rickey, in characteristic acerbic fashion, was not impressed: “Had no life, looked slow in his physical actions, and I could not help thinking that he was somewhat indifferent about his work.”

it appears that this was the first time
:
Memorandum of Game Between Santurce and Ponce at San Juan, Puerto Rico, on January 25, 1955, Branch Rickey Papers, LCMD.

“The other is Ron Necciai”
:
Branch Rickey Papers, LCMD. According to Branch Rickey’s
Little Blue Book
Necciai once struck out twenty-seven opponents in an Appalachian League game.

On his way back to Pittsburgh
:
“Mack, Rickey Meet at Terry Park,”
Fort Myers News-Press,
January 29, 1955; int. Len Harsh. The
News-Press
was published seven days a week. “I was the whole sports department,” Harsh recalled a half-century later. “And filled in covering the police beat on Sunday nights.”

Clemente and other black prospects
:
Ints. Len Harsh, John Yarborough, Pat McCutcheon, Bob Veale.

to young Clemente the prevailing culture
:
Sam Nover, “A Conversation with RC,” 1972; ints. Vic Power, Ramiro Martínez, Len Harsh.

It is not clear where
: Fort Myers News-Press,
January 15, 1955, to April 1, 1955; int. Len Harsh. “He was such a great ballplayer that they respected him,” Harsh said of south Florida fans. “He may have done a few things that people thought was hot dog but he was so doggone good it came natural to him. He was as respected as any of them.”

“ ‘Roberto, you better’”
:
Sam Nover, “A Conversation with RC,” 1972.

filed regular dispatches
: Pittsburgh Courier,
Pittsburgh weekly edition, February 15, 1955, to April 1, 1955.

old man Rickey remained uncertain
:
Observations in the game between the Chicago White Sox and the Pittsburgh Pirates, March 23, 1955, Fort Myers, Florida, Branch Rickey Papers, LCMD.

Roberts was another
: Pittsburgh Courier,
March 1955; Ronald Barlow, “A True Hometown Hero,”
Beaumont News
(Pineland, Texas);
Baseball Almanac; Rich Shrum, Pittsburgh Post-Gazette,
April 25, 2004; Joe Monaco,
Beaumont Enterprise,
May 2, 2004.