This past year, Walter Sobel received official notification of his promotion to the rank of lieutenant. The notice came 60 years after this U.S. Navy veteran would have received it had he not been in Great Lakes Hospital recovering from wounds. If we may attach a further meaning to the word “senior,” this is indeed a Lieutenant of the Senior Grade.

He also belatedly received the Purple Heart and seven other medals commemorating the campaigns that he went through on the battleship New Mexico.

Along with others who served on this ship, Walter Sobel took part in the 49th annual reunion of his shipmates, as they met in St. Louis this fall. On Jan. 6, 1945, during the battle of Lingayen Gulf, he was on the New Mexico's bridge when a Japanese Kamikaze pilot crashed into the area where he was standing.

As Officer of the Deck for General Quarters, Walter had been standing near the captain of the ship, Robert Fleming. The latter was killed, as were 30 others, including two British officers on board as observers. Walter himself was hit in the head by shrapnel, bled profusely and was carried unconscious down seven flights to the sick bay.

Later, he was transported to a hospital ship and ultimately back to the United States. The New Mexico, having managed to withstand the Lingayen Gulf attack, took part in several further actions, including the invasion of Okinawa, and finally sailed into Tokyo Bay for the Japanese surrender.

At the reunion, Walter learned that the New Mexico had been especially targeted because it was the flagship of the American fleet and was carrying high-ranking officers. In fact, the Japanese radio propagandist, Tokyo Rose, as she was called, announced on the day before the attack that this ship would be singled out as principal target.

Lucky in his survival of the attack, Walter also proved lucky at the reunion. In a raffle of memorabilia, he took chances and won both a larger and a smaller model of the ship on which he had served. The larger one, some 15 inches long, will have an honored place in his home.

After the war, this veteran of the Pacific campaign resumed his career as an architect. Based in Chicago, he has been highly successful in his field, a fact recognized by his being named a Fellow of the American Institute of Architects. He also continues to teach at the Illinois Institute of Technology and, in his 90s, remains active in professional affairs.

My source for much of this information is Richard Sobel, Walter's son. He accompanied his father to the reunion and was struck by the spirit of the old veterans there. Looking back on the traumatic events of 61 years ago, they feel proud of their part in the Allied victory over a determined and often fanatical enemy.

Four years ago, in honor of Veterans Day 2002, I wrote a column about Walter and his English friend, Geoffrey Brooke, the latter a hero of the British Navy. Among other exploits, Geoffrey survived the sinking of the battleship Prince of Wales.

As that ship was sinking, he rappelled his way by rope across the oil-dark sea to a British destroyer standing alongside. Shortly after he reached the safety of this ship, the captain had to give the command to cut the rope because of the danger to the destroyer.

A transoceanic friendship between Geoffrey and Walter has continued, though they have met only once, when I had the privilege of talking with them.

Asked about his survival, Walter now says: “The Lord was watching out for me, that's all you can say.” As to remembering the experience itself, after so many decades, he says: “It's indelible. It makes such an imprint on your memory that you can't forget.”

About age, Walter shows himself guarded. The birthday he celebrated last July he takes as the anniversary of his 39th. Of his fellow veterans at the reunion he observes: “They didn't seem old except for my former roommate. In general, they showed their age, except for a few. I have to use a walker, and that's a bummer.”

This one veteran, energized in old age, shows forth the spirit that animated so many members of the armed forces in World War II. Though I distrust the modish phrase “The Greatest Generation,” I admire the qualities of heart shown by a great many of that war's veterans. An extraordinary number of them demonstrated the personal qualities of courage and resourcefulness that still bring credit to this nation.

Virginia Woolf once wrote: “The present when backed by the past is a thousand times deeper.” That truth may well apply to this veteran of war and long living. As I understand it, his life continues to be made psychically rich by memories of experiences both hazardous and dramatic.

Walter Sobel does not live simply for these moments long ago but he does appear to draw from them material that help make his current life, itself not without trials, rewarding.

Richard Griffin

This past year, Walter Sobel received official notification of his promotion to the rank of Lieutenant. The notice came 60 years after this U.S. Navy veteran would have received it had he not been in Great Lakes Hospital recovering from wounds. If we may attach a further meaning to the word senior, this is indeed a Lieutenant of the Senior Grade.

He also belatedly received the Purple Heart and seven other medals commemorating the campaigns that he went through on the battleship New Mexico.

Along with others who served on this ship, Walter Sobel took part in the 49th annual reunion of his shipmates, as they met in St. Louis this fall. On January 6, 1945 during the battle of Lingayen Gulf, he was on the New Mexico’s bridge when a Japanese Kamikaze pilot crashed into the area where he was standing.

As Officer of the Deck for General Quarters, Walter had been standing near the captain of the ship, Robert Fleming. The latter was killed, as were 30 others including two British officers on board as observers. Walter himself was hit in the head by shrapnel, bled profusely, and was carried unconscious down seven flights to the sick bay.

Later he was transported to a hospital ship and ultimately back to the United States. The New Mexico, having managed to withstand the Lingayen Gulf attack, took part in several further actions, including the invasion of Okinawa, and finally sailed into Tokyo Bay for the Japanese surrender.

At the reunion, Walter learned that the New Mexico had been especially targeted because it was the flagship of the American fleet and was carrying high-ranking officers. In fact, the Japanese radio propagandist, Tokyo Rose, as she was called, announced on the day before the attack that this ship would be singled out as principal target.

Lucky in his survival of the attack, Walter also proved lucky at the reunion. In a raffle of memorabilia, he took chances and won both a larger and a smaller model of the ship on which he had served. The larger one, some 15 inches long, will have an honored place in his home.

After the war, this veteran of the Pacific campaign resumed his career as architect. Based in Chicago, he has been highly successful in his field, a fact recognized by his being named a Fellow of the American Institute of Architects. He also continues to teach at the Illinois Institute of Technology and, in his 90s, remains active in professional affairs.

My source for much of this information is Richard Sobel, Walter’s son. He accompanied his father to the reunion and was struck by the spirit of the old veterans there. Looking back on the traumatic events of 61 years ago they feel proud of their part in the Allied victory over a determined and often fanatical enemy.

Four years ago, in honor of Veterans Day 2002, I wrote a column about Walter and his English friend Geoffrey Brooke, the latter a hero of the British Navy. Among other exploits, Geoffrey survived the sinking of the battleship Prince of Wales.

As that ship was sinking, he rappelled his way by rope across the oil-dark sea to a British destroyer standing alongside. Shortly after he reached the safety of this ship, the captain had to give the command to cut the rope because of the danger to the destroyer.

A transoceanic friendship between Geoffrey and Walter has continued, though they have met only once, when I had the privilege of talking with them.

Asked about his survival, Walter now says: “The Lord was watching out for me, that’s all you can say.” As to remembering the experience itself, after so many decades, he says: “It’s indelible. It makes such an imprint on your memory that you can’t forget.”

About age, Walter shows himself guarded. The birthday he celebrated last July he takes as the anniversary of his 39th. Of his fellow veterans at the reunion he observes: “They didn’t seem old except for my former roommate. In general, they showed their age, except for a few. I have to use a walker and that’s a bummer.”

This one veteran, energized in old age, shows forth the spirit that animated so many members of the armed forces in World War II. Though I distrust the modish phrase “The Greatest Generation,” I admire the qualities of heart shown by a great many of that war’s veterans. An extraordinary number of them demonstrated the personal qualities of courage and resourcefulness that still bring credit to this nation.

Virginia Woolf once wrote: “The present when backed by the past is a thousand times deeper.” That truth may well apply to this veteran of war and long living. As I understand it, his life continues to be made psychically rich by memories of experiences both hazardous and dramatic.

Walter Sobel does not live simply for these moments long ago but he does appear to draw from them material that help make his current life, itself not without trials, rewarding.

Richard Griffin

According to family lore at least, my father wanted to buy a newspaper. After having been first a reporter and then Sunday Editor for many years at the old Boston Post, he would have liked to become owner of a daily or weekly outside the city.

For various reasons, it did not happen; in the last year of his life my father became editor-in-chief of the Post but he never closed a deal to become a publisher elsewhere.

Maybe the power of paternal genes accounts for my interest in publishing. How else can one explain what drove me, 16 years ago, to start a publication for my neighbors? Realists would call this rag a newsletter; however, with grandiose vision, I like to think of it as my very own newspaper.

Admittedly, it does not rival the New York Times, nor can it claim the scope of the paper you are reading now. Instead, my work features homey news provided, in large part, by neighbors themselves.

Known as The Howl, this publication takes its name from the 10-house Howland Street where I live. This name also echoes distantly the Beat poet Allen Ginsberg, whose epic “Howl” swept the country in 1955-1956. To me, the title suggests that  readers will cry out either with delight or horror, or a mixture of the two.   

The trouble with being sole proprietor of a publication, I have discovered, is the need to take on all the jobs oneself. To serve as editor, reporter, photographer, copy boy, printer and deliverer, among other roles, often proves burdensome. I have tried to lure neighbors into exercising some of these prestigious positions, but have found no takers so far.

But these same neighbors often contribute fine editorial material. Five-year-old Peter, for instance, sent us a three-line poem about a snail and adorned this verse with a fanciful drawing of several snails emerging from the grass.

And Jim, 40 years older than Peter, contributed a fascinating account of a vacation in Peru with his son. The accompanying photo of Machu Picchu was awesome.

I tell neighbors of my intention to dig up dirt about them, but this lighthearted threat serves only to push them to take the initiative with their news. Occasionally, professional writers among the neighbors have contributed to The Howl but, for the most part, we rely on amateurs.

And neighbors have been generous in sharing their expertise in desktop publishing. The most recent issue featured, for the first time, the capacity to deliver the paper by email. This enabled some readers to see photos in living color, an amenity that has added much to the pleasure of perusing The Howl.

If, in the pursuit of self-knowledge you crave experience of your fallibility, I strongly recommend starting your own publication. The effort to avoid mistakes entails constant and depressing struggle. Pain and embarrassment frequently result from what now seem to me inevitable slips.

In the October issue, I managed to confuse the name of my next-door neighbor─who is a good friend, and whom I have known for decades─with that of a television personality. She has, I think, forgiven me.

Another neighbor, though, wrote me a stinging letter denouncing me and all my works. She demanded, and received, the cancellation of her non-existent subscription.

Many years ago, a neighbor who is a highly successful realtor credited The Howl with increasing property values in our neighborhood. In fact, we have observed at least one other professional in the house-selling field providing a copy of the publication for his customers to peruse.

But this publisher’s purpose does not center on economic considerations. Instead, my driving force has always been to build neighborhood solidarity. Sharing news and experience among those who live in the same area strikes me as conducive to good relationships. It is one way of fostering cohesion in groups of people who differ from one another in many ways.

This purpose can make perhaps make The Howl seem like a paper that Don Quixote might have published. And, in pursuit of my idealistic goal, I am prepared to fight windmills, the way Cervantes’s hero did. However, I can supply some evidence that the main aspirations behind The Howl have found at least modest fulfillment.

I will soon be sending forth ethereal words (via email) announcing the annual holiday issue. If I can persuade the writer closest to my heart to compose her often-annual poetic tribute to neighbors, I will feel myself off to a top-flight start. Ideally, adult neighbors with literary ambitions will contribute stylish essays. And maybe local urchins will report with gusto on Halloween and other fall activities.

In any event, my dreams of exercising freedom of the press will continue to be fulfilled. Using the computer as a successor to Gutenberg’s printing press, I fantasize myself a publishing tycoon.

Surely, my father would have approved.

Richard Griffin

“Rules for Old Men Waiting” does not meet my standards for a felicitous book title.  Almost every word carries connotations that many browsers will take as off-putting.

First, who will get excited about rules? They bring back images of classroom discipline or, perhaps, military demands.

And does anyone want to read about aging? People in the publishing business will tell you that the word “old” is toxic.

Thirdly, “waiting” suggests passivity, something no true-blue American wants to be accused of, especially when the waiting is for death.

Despite this handicap, however, the book turns out to be well worth reading. It took Peter Pouncey, its author, 23 years to write it. Getting the book published when, as he says, he was “two thirds of a century old,” counts as a notable achievement for this late-blooming novelist. His academic duties, first as dean of Columbia University and then president of Amherst College, delayed the birth of this work.

“Rules” features a novel within a novel, a tricky device for a writer to pull off. Its chief story, in the inner framework, is a grimy and suspenseful tale of British soldiers in the trenches of World War I. A rich diversity of character among the troops looms large in this account of deadly conflict within their ranks.

But I find myself most taken by what the narrator tells us about a man’s life in its later stages. I zeroed in on the way Pouncey’s chief character, MacIver, manages his physical decline. He does so in large part by formulating the set of rules referred to in the title.

The man has lost his beloved wife and now faces life alone in the rustic Cape Cod cottage where they had chosen to retire. Margaret was a beautiful person and MacIver desperately misses her. Her loss followed the death of their only son in the Vietnam War, years before, when MacIver and his wife were still in middle age.

The old man feels himself slipping into the abyss of isolation and, even worse, self-neglect. Soon he realizes that he must do something to arrest this frightening descent. That is what moves him to formulate a set of rules for his daily effort to regain hold of himself.

Here is his seven-point agenda:

1. Keep personally clean;
2. Make bed every morning, and clean house twice a week;
3. Dress warmly, and light fire when necessary, burning least important things first;
4. Eat regularly;
5. Play music and read;
6. Television only in the evening, except for weekend and seasonal showdown sports;
7. Work every morning. Nap in the afternoon if needed.

This agenda speaks to me. In fact, I implement most of it myself by long ingrained habit. However, I do not clean the house at all, much less twice a week. That seems to me excessive, though, perhaps for MacIver it serves as a kind of therapy.

Nor do I light fires or burn. But that practice would help reduce the rubble of paper in my office to manageable proportions.

Yes to television, under exactly the same conditions the man sets for himself.  How would I ever have deprived myself, this season, of the late-game heroics of Big Papi and his Red Sox compadres? And without watching the news on public TV, I would find world and national events much less vibrant.

The virtues of naps, taken in moderation, prove hard to exaggerate. A half-hour’s sleep, in the afternoon slump time, counts for me as a sovereign remedy for the trials of soul and body.

Surely the most glaring omission in the list is contact with other people. Like the rest of us, MacIver badly needs to be in touch with others who can relate to him.

Of course, physical exercise deserves explicit mention as well; MacIver’s making the bed and cleaning the house provide some muscular exertion but these activities fall far short of the mark.

Not everyone desires to follow MacIver’s agenda, of course, and many could not do so. Many of my age peers have developed other schemes that work well for them. They may include prayer, for example, an activity (or passivity) that rates no mention in MacIver’s list.

This fictional person, however, does write, a pursuit that often seems to me an extension of prayer. Writing factual material or fiction can be taken as a service to others, at least if they have the opportunity to read your stuff.

Spiritual exercise is an important component of a well-rounded daily schedule, it seems to me. Contemplation adds a vital element to later life, one too little noticed by the seers who discourse about aging.

As chapter one concludes, MacIver has fined-tuned three of his rules further and winds up with ten. “On the whole,” the author writes of his protagonist, “he felt he had brought some order to his abject life. These were tough, good rules─tough but fair.”

Richard Griffin

Around the middle of this month, the United States government will make a notable announcement: it will declare this nation to have 300 million residents. The Census Bureau will officially certify the number, making our country only the third in the world, after China and India, to have at least this many people.

We have come a long way in a short time. On the day of my birth in 1928 we had only 120 million. By 1968 that number had jumped to 200 million, and now, fewer than four decades later, we have reached 300.

More striking than the number of people is our diversity. In my memory, nearly everyone used to look like me, white and fair-skinned. Now, in many parts of our country, you see people of many different looks.

We expect to find congested variety on New York City subway cars, but you can find some of the same diversity in Des Moines. On my visits there, I have been pleasantly surprised to find a more than a few people from African countries as fellow worshipers at the cathedral.

These neighbors have brought new variety into our lives. Routinely, we eat sushi, tortillas, and pad thai. Our sports stadiums feature newly popular games, and they resound with new languages as do our churches. New communities of faith have sprung up, and we have friends and colleagues who worship in the Hindu, Buddhist or Muslim tradition.

How should one feel about these demographic changes that have so transformed the US of A? For me, it’s largely matter for celebration. Our size and our diversity are precious resources. Our new populations grace us with new opportunities. The astounding variety within our 50 states can benefit us all.

However, our national arrival at 300 million also provokes questions. Why, for example, in such a large and mixed nation, is our national leadership so poor? Cannot we find men and women better equipped to guide us toward fulfillment of our potential?

Our current leadership, president and Congress alike, have led us into war on which this nation spends some six billion dollars a month. Our nation has immense resources, and immense needs as well; why are we mortgaging the future in the interest of dubious short-term goals?

To cite one example: when we can boast of so many inventive citizens, why does this country persist in its reliance on huge imports of oil? Surely we have enough people skilled in science and technology to discover alternative fuels and put them to use.

And why are so many of our fellow Americans, over two million of them, confined to prison? There must be creative ways of transforming this unfortunate situation, unique in the world.

That more than 40 million of our 300 million people live without the security of health insurance is a scandal that cries out for remedy. Such deprivation should not be tolerated in a nation so rich and so creative.

An aspect of the new American diversity for which I have special feeling is the aging of the population. With the eye of a gerontologist himself growing into late life, I observe how many of my fellow citizens have reached my advanced years or even further. You don’t have to visit Florida to notice it either: walk down any city sidewalk and you will be impressed by how many people outrank you in age.

This demographic evolution is often presented as an intractable problem. However, the graying of America better deserves to be seen as an opportunity. By reason of more advanced schooling and improved health, many Americans middle-aged and older are equipped to work for the good of the community. That vision is what drives Civic Ventures, a national movement that highlights the potential of elders for pitching in.     

Immigration, which is part of the collective memory of most American families, continues to enrich this nation. Many of the workers we meet in restaurants, health clinics, taxi cabs, and stores have clearly arrived from another part of the world.

When I ask where they come from, they tell me Brazil, Sudan, Vietnam or other far-away places. Some have escaped from murderous conditions in their native country; nearly all have found a better economic situation for themselves and their families.

It is impossible not to be moved by their stories. I feel pleasure at their good fortune and a new awareness of the privileges that I enjoy as a U.S. citizen.         

Demographers expect this nation’s population to level off at about 400 million a few decades from now. Given our immigration and birth rates, they project that the United States will retain its ranking as third largest nation after China and India. This figure should assure the US of continued great human resources.

If only we can learn to deploy them better!

Richard Griffin

One farmer, Arnaldus Palaganus, has suffered the theft of his two oxen and appeals to the king’s agent for justice. Another, Ysardus Gaufredi, has had his grain stolen by the local bailiff in whose tower it was kept for safekeeping. He, too, has a grievance that he hopes will be set right.

These events took place some 800 years ago in Languedoc, a region in the south of France. Thanks to documents written on paper or parchment, historians know about them in detail. Scholars can study these stories, among other reasons, to understand better what life was like in those medieval times.

That is the driving force behind the research of Anne Porter, a graduate student of my acquaintance. Anne spent several weeks this summer at work in libraries located in Paris, Nîmes, and Montpellier, reading 13th-century documents in preparation for writing a thesis.

What draws me to this student’s research is my fascination with the way people lived long before the modern era. The discovery of attitudes and habits of mind stirs in me continued interest. Not situated or equipped to do such research myself, I take pleasure in the work of scholars who devote their lives to such an enterprise.

It’s hard work, reading the documents. The paper on which they are written is fragile. And this young woman is confronted with language long fallen into disuse. “Getting used to medieval Latin was hard at first─a lot of different vocabulary for one thing─but after you’ve worked with a lot of medieval docs, it just becomes second nature,” she tells me by email.

Anne finds the main documents, called “the complaints,” in Paris but she also travels to the two southern cities where she looks for deeds, wills, acts of homage, and other material to provide more detail. In particular, she hopes to find “traces of people who appear in the complaints.”

The complaints were addressed to the agents sent out by Louis IX, King of France in the first half of the 13th century. These royal agents were empowered to arbitrate grievances made against local officials. In about two thirds of the cases the King’s men reversed such decisions and redressed grievances.

Louis IX had the reputation of being an unusually good man. In fact, this view of him was so widespread that he was later declared a saint, one still honored as such by the Catholic Church.

Asked about this king’s reputation for sanctity, Anne Porter hedges. As the documents witness, he clearly treated the people of Languedoc well, but this young scholar tends to think he had a double motive.

Their area had been incorporated into the kingdom of France shortly before, and Louis was anxious to please the people of this southern region so as to secure its place in his realm. However, the documents suggest that he also cared about them and their concerns.

While perhaps admiring him for some of his personal traits, we citizens of the 21st century would be likely to give Louis bad marks for some of his military actions. Having been so gung-ho about the Crusades, for example.

But, as a person of the pre-modern age, he clearly brought a different standard for judgment to what now appear as shameful military excursions differently: he and those around him considered the Crusades a service offered to God.

Incidentally, centuries later, when one of his successors, Louis XVI, was about to be guillotined during the French Revolution, the attending chaplain reportedly said to him: “Fils de Saint Louis, montez au ciel” (Son of St. Louis, go up to heaven.) So, whatever doubts remain about his moral stature, the memory of the 13th century king had resonance long after his own era.

And what of his subjects who lodged complaints? Were they citizens in the modern sense? Not quite, answers my researcher friend. “Being a civis (Latin for citizen) carried very specific legal rights─rights of transit, different taxes, etc.─but had less to do with political participation.”

As to civil rights, they would not have used the words to indicate something that belongs to each person. “Things were wrong because they were contrary to law or custom, not because they violated someone’s rights,” my friend responds.

Anne Porter is engaged in a fascinating enterprise, but she experiences the ups and downs typical of graduate students doing research. When her progress is evident, she feels great. But when the inevitable doubts about the value of her work set in, the project can seem to her “pointless and misguided.”

Even in these moments, however, she remembers one insight: “I think fundamental self-doubt may be in integral part of dissertation writing.”

I admire her and other students confronted with the challenges of research and writing. They strike me as engaged in work that has importance for the community. Not all research, of course, has this kind of value but the effort to discover more about how our predecessors lived and thought deserves appreciation and moral support.

Richard Griffin

“A lot of them don’t want to pitch any more, a lot of them don’t wanna pitch beyond the sixth inning.”  This is Joe Morgan’s response to my thesis about changes in the way major-league baseball is played these days.

I had suggested that batters today don’t just want to get hits; they want to wear down the pitcher. They use new tactics to accomplish this: the intentional foul ball and, when possible, not swinging at pitches. These have become offensive weapons designed to force the starting pitcher to exceed his pitch count and to exit by the fifth inning, if not sooner.

When, on August 18th, the Red Sox and the Yankees played the longest nine-inning game ever, guess how many foul balls there were. An astounding 93!  Yankee batters like Derek Jeter and Bobby Abreu make a specialty of this, but other hitters, Yankees and the Red Sox, have adopted the practice.

Only in certain tense situations, however, do foul balls provide much excitement. Usually, they are time-consuming interruptions in the action. Foul balls are not the only factor, of course, in lengthening games. But they play a significant role in the additional hour that games now last, by contrast with games in 1940.

The Joe Morgan mentioned above (not to be confused with the Hall of Famer and broadcaster of the same name) became the manager of the Red Sox during the 1985 season and presided over the “Morgan miracle” when the team won 12 straight games.

“You know why they wear them out?” Morgan asks. “Because the pitchers don’t throw strikes.” And that, according to this old pro, has happened because of expansion. But, he adds, “thank God for all the Latin players.”

For Morgan, the best baseball ever played was in the pre-expansion era, when Jackie Robinson, followed by an influx of great black and Latino players, took the game to new heights. He says that current major leaguers are bigger and stronger, but lack staying power.

Now 75, this Walpole native shared his views with me before the 2006 Oldtime Baseball Game, an event promoted by Boston Herald sportswriter Steve Buckley and staged in Cambridge to benefit children with cerebral palsy or cystic fibrosis.

An older veteran, Johnny Pesky appeared in his Red Sox uniform, seeming remarkably trim and fit at age 86. To me, in bodily shape he looks little different from when I first saw him play in 1942. His only obvious defect is that he does not agree with my thesis about the most recent changes in the game.

 “You’re wrong,” he says about my views “They try to hit every ball out of the ball park.”

Another veteran, Lenny Merullo, will be 90 next May. Dressed in a Chicago Cubs uniform, he, like Pesky, is physically and mentally vibrant. A native of the Orient Heights section of East Boston, he broke in with the Cubs in 1941 and played his whole career with that team.

A slick fielding shortstop, Merullo made himself indispensable, even though he was never a strong hitter. He boasts of holding the major league record for making the most errors in the same inning: four.

“We never heard of the term ‘pitch count’ in my day,” says this big leaguer. “Pitchers used to pace themselves so they could go nine innings – they don’t do that now.” But he, too, refuses to buy my explanation.

Fortunately for me, the three former major leaguers─Morgan, Pesky, and Merullo─were not the only baseball authorities present that evening. Historian Doris Kearns Goodwin was also at the field to throw out the first ball. She threw it with authority, like someone who has had a long familiarity with the game.

In complimenting her on this pitch, I told her that I would have fouled it off. By contrast with the three former players, Goodwin tended to agree with my thesis. As an old-time Brooklyn Dodger addict, she remembers the game as being very different and pitchers often going the nine inning route.

That the games at Ebbets Field were so much shorter than games today points to changes in their very structure, I claim, an explanation for which Goodwin shows sympathy.

As I see it, some forms of specialization have changed the structure of major league baseball, and not for the better. In particular, dividing pitchers into starters, middle relievers, closers, has broken the continuity of the game.

Bringing in someone to pitch to only one batter, quite often a lefty to face a left-handed hitter, does not add much to the game except time. The intentional foul ball and the needless accumulation of pitches contribute to this new tedium.

I’m glad to have a major league historian in sympathy with me. Granted, she and I never played ball in the big time. Why can’t those ancients who did─Morgan, Pesky, and Merullo─see it my way?                                                          

Richard Griffin