19TH HOLE: THE READERS TAKE OVER
LITTER BOARDS
Sirs:
I was both amazed and discouraged by the paradoxical position my favorite magazine took under SCORECARD in the Sept. 4 issue. You urge that we Bring Back the Billboards and under the title Keep It Clean on the same page you take a stand for "cleaner banks on rivers, cleaner sewage around cities" and cleaner outer space. What difference does it make whether litter along the highway is lying down or being propped up in the form of cheap advertising rubbish?
WAYNE LINN
Logan, Utah
Sirs:
Now that America has some highways that are sufficiently free of billboards to permit citizens to see their landscape, perhaps they can learn enough about it to "engage the mind" and thus relieve their boredom.
ARTHUR E. NEWKIRK
Schenectady
Sirs:
The Garden Club gals are burned up and so am I.
RALPH W. TENNANT
Easton, Md.
Sirs:
Boo! Hiss!
JAMES G. MCGOWAN
Greenwich, Conn.
STILL LIVELY
Sirs:
It seems to me that those now yelling "lively ball" at the tops of their lungs are most likely descendants of those who screamed "lively ball" in 1927 (Yes, It's Livelier, Aug. 28). I attribute any increase in home runs to the lighter bats and the batters' intentions.
DENNIS PORTEUS
Plainview, N.Y.
Sirs:
I do not doubt that the baseball has changed through the years, but your implication that the dilution of pitching talent due to expansion endangers Ruth's record is unjustified. The population of the U.S. increased by almost 50% between 1927 and 1961; it is probable that talent increased just about proportionally. Consider also the breaking of the color barrier.
CAM GIBSON
Oakland, Calif.
GLOBAL FLAVOR
Sirs:
Your Carry Back spread was most interesting (Carry Back Comes Back, Sept. 4). However, your caption writer overlooked Laurel's Washington, D.C. International as the world's most important international horse race.
BOB MELENDEZ
Washington, D.C.
Sirs:
France's Prix de l'Arc de Triomphe doesn't compare in international scope with the Washington, D.C. International.
In nine runnings top Thoroughbreds from 15 countries have been represented in this global classic.
M. B. HIRSH
Bethesda, Md.
RED RUNNERS
Sirs:
In your article The Outs and Ins of the Double Play (Sept. 4) you picture double-playing Dodgers Neal and Wills being foiled by someone you call just a "runner." The runner is Cincinnati Red Gordon Coleman. In your article on the Dodgers-Reds series (Jinxed and Jinxed Again, Sept. 4) a picture caption identifies Dodger Wills but leaves another "runner" unnamed. The runner is the Cincinnati Reds' Chico Cardenas.
Yes, Virginia, there really are Cincinnati Reds and they have names.
DAN DIORIO
Bellevue, Ky.
Sirs:
If SPORTS ILLUSTRATED made any sense at all, the Cincinnati Reds would have been cast as a strong, talented, serious pennant contender months ago.
WALT GAGEN
Cincinnati
COOKED TATERS
Sirs:
Hooray! It's about time you gave "Ol' Taters" and the Tigers a little credit (Taters Keeps the Tigers Up There, Sept. 4).
CADET STEPHEN M. OVERTON
West Point, N.Y.
Sirs:
I thoroughly enjoyed your article on Frank Lary, the best pitcher in the American League. I'm happy that you recognize our Tigers as the pennant contenders they are.
JOHN LATTIER
Detroit
•Or were.—ED.
Sirs:
Now it's mashed taters.
KENNETH LETOILE
Providence
CRICKET HEARTHS
Sirs:
As a cricket-loving expatriate I was delighted to see that you realized the essence and strength of English cricket lies in the hundreds of thousands of club and village cricketers who turn out every Saturday and Sunday (This Is Cricket!, Aug. 28).
A. KITCHENER
Poughkeepsie, N.Y.
Sirs:
It wasn't always just the English. Here in Philadelphia at both the Philadelphia and Merion Cricket Clubs, so named because cricket in the 19th century was more popular than tennis, there was great interest in the game during the "golden" years between 1870 and 1912. In those days there were actually 300 cricket clubs in the United States!
In 1874 a tournament between Britain, Canada and the U.S. was played in Halifax, Nova Scotia. Twenty-two players from Philadelphia represented America and won the Halifax Cup.
The famous English cricketer C. B. Fry recently wrote that "the best swerver I ever saw in my life was J. Barton King, of Philadelphia." A swerve in cricket bowling is something like a curve in baseball pitching. King is included in the list of 11 greatest cricketers of all time according to an old issue of The American Cricketer. Other famous names from this bygone era are Percy H. Clark, George S. Patterson, C. C. Morris and John L. Evans. The latter two gentlemen, in a match at Wimbledon in 1921, scored 239 runs without the loss of a wicket.
EDMUND THAYER JR.
Secretary, Merion Cricket Club
Haverford, Pa.