This golden age of New York baseball was just before my time — but the dinner table, front porch and eventually corner bar tales from family and friends who lived it was passed down like religion. The Dodgers left my native Brooklyn the year of my birth, so it wasn’t ’till I was in my teens before I fully understood the impact of this, not to mention the New York Giants bolting West the same year. My Brooklyn-born father took me to every Yankee game he could afford to, but it wasn’t until years later I realized he was a Dodger fan at heart, but never tried to indoctrinate me, which I thank him for in Heaven to this day.
This novel covers an era in baseball we’ll never see repeated. If you’re from the New York area and came of age during this time, this is a must-read.
Celebrated sports writer Roger Kahn casts his gaze on the golden age of baseball, an unforgettable time when the game thrived as America’s unrivaled national sport. The Era begins in 1947 with Jackie Robinson changing major league baseball forever by taking the field for the Dodgers. Dazzling, momentous events characterize the decade that followed-Robinson’s amazing accomplishments; the explosion on the national scene of such soon-to-be legends as Mickey Mantle, Willie Mays, Bobby Thomson, Duke Snider, and Yogi Berra; Casey Stengel’s crafty managing; the emergence of televised games; and the stunning success of the Yankees as they play in nine out of eleven World Series. The Era concludes with the relocation of the Dodgers from Brooklyn to Los Angeles, a move that shook the sport to its very roots.
