Unlike Hank the ballpark pup, this dog doesn’t like baseball
Editor’s note: On rare occasions, Milwaukee Journal humor writer Gerald Kloss turned his “Slightly Kloss-Eyed” column in the Green Sheet over to another writer. With the following column — published 53 years ago today, on July 13, 1964 — he put it in the paws of his dog, Spike.
Here’s a glossary of some of the contemporary terms in this column that aren’t so contemporary anymore:
Carbon paper: What used to be slipped in between two pieces of paper when you typed something and wanted to make a copy at the same time
Baldy of Nome: Iditarod sled dog that went back to rescue the sled’s driver (later the basis of a children’s adventure book of the same name)
County Stadium, Eddie Mathews, Warren Spahn: Milwaukee’s major-league stadium before Miller Park, where Milwaukee Braves stars Mathews and Spahn shined 500: a game of catch where points are given based on the challenges to said catches
Rin Tin Tin : A German shepherd that, after serving in World War I, became one of the silent era’s biggest movie stars
Our dog Spike, who holds a second mortgage on the den typewriter, wrote another letter to his former owner the other day, leaving, as usual, a carbon for publication. (Spike is a literary-type dog, and his magnum opus nowadays is a definitive biography of Baldy of Nome, bringing out several previously unrecorded insights into Baldy’s life as a puppy.) His letter follows: “Dear Kathy, “Baseball, baseball, baseball. That’s what I live with day in, day out, with these two boys. It’s enough to drive you to chasing cars or gas meter men or something.
“This is backyard baseball, and I understand it is quite a bit different from another type of baseball that is played in other places, such as County Stadium. In the games that I view from the patio, just outside the back door, the rules go like this:
“1. Dogs shall not be allowed to chase loose baseballs, no matter how easily they can reach them. The penalty is a firm knock on the tailbone, and the rule is strictly enforced.
“2. Since there are usually only three players on the field, a player is declared out if he doesn’t reach first base by the time somebody picks up the ball and throws it to the pitcher.
“3. No base stealing is allowed, since the catcher is a member of the other team, and if he had a chance to throw out a base-stealer at second or third base, he’d probably throw the ball over the second or third baseman’s head, if there were enough guys to be there in the first place, which there wouldn’t be.
“4. After each pitch, there must be an argument. The best words to use in these arguments are ‘stupid,’ ‘what a dope’ and ‘boy, what a stupid dope.’ The player who says these words the loudest wins the game.
“So much for baseball, Kathy. Its appeal, frankly, seems rather limited to me. I must say that the boys have picked up some nice touches — Mike, for example, knocks the dirt off his tennis shoes exactly as Eddie Mathews does on TV, and Tim stares down at the catcher in the best Warren Spahn fashion — but their total feeling of discrimination against dogs is dismaying, to say the least.
“Even in warm-up practice, or playing 500, the boys discourage my attendance on the field. I couldn’t care less, of course, but I think they could couch their reprimands more subtly than by shouting, ‘Get out of here, Spike!’ or ‘Drop that ball, you dumb dog!’ or ‘Stop innafering with our game!’ They’re young, of course, and they don’t realize how much such phrases can cut.
“Enough of these complaints! In general, life has been peaceful, and I am well fed and watered. I’ve started the Great Books bit, and am halfway through the adventures of Rin Tin Tin. Great stuff, although it suffers in translation. “Gnawingly yours, “Spike”