Joe DiMaggio, 56 in '41

I finished reading Kostya Kennedy’s “56 Joe DiMaggio” this afternoon. In my March 12, 2011 Blog, I wrote about the Sports Illustrated cover story of the book in their March 14 issue.  While that story focused on the game where he broke George Sisler’s 41 game streak, the book picks up at about the 20 game point and carries the reader right on through his 56 consecutive game hitting streak in 1941. The book includes enough “personal” information on DiMaggio to make it interesting. The writer also brings in the war in Europe and the tensions that existed in this country among many of the recent Italian and German immigrants. Joe’s parents didn’t get their citizenship until he was with the Yankees. I enjoyed reading and refreshing my memory of the names of the many baseball players of that era as well as the descriptions of many of the ballparks that we have visited. It also includes a probability section on the very slim likelyhood that the record will ever be broken.