one of the pleasures of writing a book is the independence of it: the author gets to call ’em as she sees ’em. One of the difficulties is the isolation of it. So I am grateful for the team who helped me through this. The staffs of the New York Public Library and Tim Wiles and Claudette Burke at the National Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown were all professional and helpful. My informal writing seminar—Mary Child, Timothy Dumas, Humphrey Hawksley, Christopher Hunt, and Margaret O’Connor— helped me through some rough patches. Robert Creamer not only wrote a warm introduction, but also read the manuscript with his characteristic eye for.