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Yankees Lucky

Edgy MD Jun 06 2017 01:27 PM

I have a co-worker here who is even more of a baseball nerd than I am. He's written an official history of the Orioles and is also pretty much an expert on the Indians and Yankees, and he found a small item in a 1945 Sporting News. Yankees Lucky—Missed Bomber Crash in Offices HOLLYWOOD, Calif.—The long-distance conversation went something like this: "Hello, Larry (MacPhail), this is Del (Webb). How's everything going—not so good, I guess." "That's right, Del. Weather's been lousy. Never seen so much rain for this time for the year. It his us hard then Joe (McCarthy) being sick hurts, too." "Yes, that's too bad, and give Joe my best, but even so, Larry, the Yankees are mighty lucky." "Lucky, did you say lucky?" blared MacPhail. "You're damned right, I said lucky." retorted Del. "Have you forgotten we almost leased the 78th floor of the Empire State Building for our offices—or haven't you heard about that plane crashing into the spot we planned our private offices and killing a lot of people.?" P.S." A ten minute ride in the express elevator didn't suit Webb, so the Yanks leased the seventeenth floor of the Squibb Building. JOHN B. OLD The connection is that when the Yankees passed the tenant who took the 78th floor was our agency, and amazingly, the only deaths besides the three crew members were 11 people from our offices. (Doubly amazing to me was that nobody on the ground was killed.) It was early in our existence, so it's part of the lore of the agency, but it's the first time I heard our folks had swapped fates with Del F. Webb and Larry F. MacPhail. Also notable in the sense of entitlement that bleeds through. A little rain and the manager being laid up and Larry MacPhail whines about the Yankees being unlucky. Hey, Larry, there's a fucking World War going on.