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Summary: A BREATH OF FRESH AIR
Review: I REALLY ENJOYED THIS BOOK. ELDEN AUKER DOES A GREAT JOB DESCRIBING HOW IT WAS WHEN MEN WERE MEN. TODAYS ATHLETES ARE SO PAMPERED, SPOILED AND GREEDY. TO MIX WITH THE PEOPLE HE DID IN HIS LIFE IS QUITE UNIQUE. HE CERTAINLY IS A GOOD STORY TELLER AND IS QUITE AN INTERESTING MAN. HE AND THE PEOPLE FROM HIS TIME ARE MUCH TOUGHER AND HAVE MUCH TO OFFER TO THE NOW GENERATION OF NO DISCIPLINE, I BEFORE ANYONE ELSE, AND THE LAZY WORK ETHICS THAT NOW EXIST IN THE WORLD. YOUNG PEOPLE SHOULD LEARN FROM PEOPLE LIKE ELDEN AUKER. VERY RECOMMENDED.
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Summary: Great book for fans of baseball history!
Review: I was given this book as a gift and I think it's great! If you love baseball history, you'll love this book!
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Summary: A gem!
Review: Inside baseball through the intelligent and unassuming eyes of a little-known, but great, athlete of the 1930's and 40's, and a successful businessman thereafter.
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Summary: Finally, a good baseball book
Review: It's inconceivable that this man, 90 years old, had such a wealth of stories, yet no one had ever bothered to ask him to write a book. This is the best baseball book I've read since Boys of Summer. Very entertaining and well written.
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Summary: Ranks well above most baseball memoirs
Review: Oerall, an enjoyable memoir. Auker, a submarine pitcher who might be classified as a member of baseball's solid middle class of performers, had a long and successful career in business after his playing days. At age 90, he apparently continues to live independently with his wife of almost 70 years in retirement in Florida. His tales mostly ring true, allowing for the human habit of telling things in a way that enhances the role of the storyteller somewhat. This book ranks well above most baseball memoirs, if not, in my opinion, as high as "Rowdy Richard" (Dick Bartell's autobiography) or "Cobb Would Have Caught It" covering Detroit Tigers baseball over the years. I would have given this book 41/2 stars if that rating were available. I do question, as did one earlier reviewer, the story concerning Joe Jackson's effort to return mob money to Comiskey, who refused to take it; that is one I have never heard before, unlike the story of Durocher stealing from Babe Ruth & being beaten up by the Babe as a result, a story long in circulation. One of the book's sidebars, presumably not by Auker, contains one of the biggest errors ever allowed to slip into a baseball memoir. It states that Babe Ruth hit .271 with 6 homers in 1934, the year he hit his 700th homer at Navin Field in Detroit. Who let this whopper slip by? A quick glance at the record books by the writer or editor would have disclosed that Ruth hit .288 with 22 homers & 84 RBIs that year-not very Ruthian but hardly as putrid as the writer would have it. (Nor could it be a reference to his statistics at the time of the 700th homer which was his 14th of that season.) Where did those numbers come from? There is also a reference, in the body of the book, to Auker pitching in the first game of the 1935 World Series in Chicago; actually, the first game was in Detroit & the third game of the series,which was the first game played in Chicago, is the game being referenced. Not technically an error but confusingly worded. These minor things aside, the book is a quick, fun read & should be enjoyed by all baseball fans.
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Summary: Great insight into baseball in the 30's
Review: This book makes you want to go back in time when life was simpler and baseball was a just a game!The author seems like a genuinely nice man with a practical opinion about the sport and the people around him. He gives great insight into some personalities whom the media may have disorted. Funny and sad.
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Summary: Where has this book been?
Review: This is a tremendously entertaining and well-written book, leading me to wonder why in the world no one tapped into this invaluable source of baseball history until he was 90 years old. I haven't read a baseball book this good since the Boys of Summer came out.
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Summary: The baseball book you've been waiting for!
Review: True fans have always known that the real story of baseball players and their lives lay somewhere between the idealized William Bendix/Gary Cooper portrayals of Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig, and the hatchet jobs done by Jim Bouten and his like. "Sleeper Cars and Flannel Uniforms" is that story. Elden Auker and Tom Keegan tell the story of baseball players who are basically honest, moral and hard-working guys doing a job, albeit one of the best jobs anyone could ever have. Do they have their faults and weaknesses, their bouts with anger and depression? Yes, of course. Who doesn't? Do they love their job and the game of baseball? Yes, but they don't obsess over it. They love their families and friends more. This book is touching and sincere, funny and raunchy all at once. This is a wonderful story and a wonderful book, engagingly told and smartly written. It is a must read for baseball fans, or for anyone looking for a good read that also helps keep life in perspective.
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