The Glory of Their Times
The Glory of Their Times: The Story of the Early Days of Baseball Told by the Men Who Played It is a 1966 book, edited by Lawrence Ritter, telling the stories of early 20th century baseball. It is widely acclaimed as one of the greatest books ever written about baseball.
Preparation
Ritter got the idea for the book in 1961 upon the death of
Ritter realized that those who played baseball in the early years of the 20th century were now old men, and he resolved to interview as many of them as he could in order to record their memories. Ritter travelled 75,000 miles to interview his subjects, sitting for hours listening to them tell their tales into his tape recorder. The book retells their stories in the first-person, as they were told to Ritter.
Publication
The interviews were made between 1962 and 1966. The book was published in September 1966, following four years of research, interviews and preparation. An enlarged edition was issued in 1984, with the additions of George Gibson, Babe Herman, Specs Toporcer, and Hank Greenberg. A positive review by
A vinyl album containing some of the actual recordings of the interviews was released in the 1970s. More recently, with the popularity of books-on-tape, longer versions of the recordings have been released on audiocassette and CD.
Interviews
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Crawford, Greenberg, Roush and Waner were already members of the
Documentary film
A documentary film for The Glory of Their Times was produced in 1971 by Ritter and Bud Greenspan, showing much of the still photography used in the book, along with vintage film footage and recordings from the audio tapes Ritter used in researching the book. After being rejected by commercial networks for several years due to Greenspan's refusal to edit for length, the film aired on PBS television in 1977.
See also
References
- ^ "Books Today". The New York Times: 38. September 26, 1966.
- ^ a b Appell, Marty (April 2001). "Glory of Their Times". Sports Collectors Digest.
- ^ Sheed, Wilfred (September 18, 1966). "Take Me Back to the Ballgame". The New York Times.