Babe Ruth Built the Best Brand Ever

Our digitized world is obsessed with branding.  The road to success, we’re told, is to create a public image of a consistent experience/product/person that people will want to acquire or be exposed to. That’s why the trade association for accountants published “Five Tips to Branding Yourself” (how, in fact, do accountants brand themselves?).  It’s why Success Magazine…

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Up Next: G. Washington, America's Master Politician

I’ve just signed with a Penguin imprint, New American Library, to write a book about The Big Guy — GWash himself, the Master of Mount Vernon, the man-myth who was indisputably the key figure in the founding of the United States and without whom, well, things would have gone very different and a whole lot…

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Africa Days and Nights

Coming home from 17 days in East Africa last month, jazzed by how fascinating our visit had been and conscious of how little I know about Africa, I scooped up Ryszard Kapuscinski’s The Shadow of the Sun while wandering around the Arusha (Tanzania) Airport.  What a stroke of luck! We went to Africa mostly to see…

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225th Birthday of America's Bill of Rights!

I’m delighted to be among the first to proclaim the 225th anniversary of the ratification of America’s Bill of Rights, the first ten amendments to the Constitution.  Those amendments protect individual liberties that Americans hold most dear, and became central to our national character after the Fourteenth Amendment (adopted in 1868) applied them against state…

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Babe Ruth in Pictures

Though my Babe Ruth book’s a novel — as in FICTION — one of the fun consequences of writing about the Babe has come when people share with me their Babe memorabilia.  Because the Babe was way more than just a great ballplayer.  He was and remains a huge cultural figure.  I offer a couple…

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Winning by Losing: Babe Ruth at the 1921 World Series

When Babe Ruth led the New York Yankees into their first World Series ever in 1921 — 95 years ago — he had just finished what may have been the best season a hitter has ever had:  59 home runs, 161 RBIs, a .378 batting average.  He scored 177 runs.  Opposing teams hated to pitch…

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Babe Ruth: Know your enemy!

Babe Ruth was a great pitcher before he was a great hitter.  Doesn’t it seem likely that one of the reasons he was a great hitter was because he had been a great pitcher? Playing for the Boston Red Sox from 1915 to 1918, the Babe was probably the best left-handed pitcher in the American League.  He…

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Why Do Babe Ruth Movies Mostly Suck?

With less than three weeks to go until my novel concerning Babe Ruth debuts, The Babe Ruth Deception, I find myself wondering why Babe Ruth movies are so bad.  In fairness, though, not all of them are terrible, at least not when he wasn’t the focus of the film. He played himself in The Pride…

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