Mike Donlin

A Rough and Rowdy Life from New York Baseball Idol to Stage and Screen

Steve Steinberg, Lyle Spatz (Autoren)

Buch | Hardcover

368 Seiten

2024
University of Nebraska Press (Verlag)
978-1-4962-3896-2 (ISBN)

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A biography of early twentieth-century baseball player and actor Mike Donlin, one of the best hitters and most colorful players in the history of the game. Haunted by tragedy, he was a showman and an alcoholic, married one of the nation’s most famous vaudeville actresses—who turned his life around, and acted on the stage and in approximately one hundred films.

Mike Donlin was a brash, colorful, and complicated personality. He was the most popular athlete in New York and was a star on the powerful New York Giants teams of 1905 and 1908. Though haunted by tragedy, including the deaths of both of his parents as a boy, Donlin was a charming, engaging, and kind-hearted man who also had successful careers on the stage and in film.

One of the early “bad boys” among professional athletes, Donlin’s temper and combativeness—compounded by alcoholism—led to battles with umpires and fans, numerous suspensions from the game, and even jail time. In 1906, when Donlin married vaudeville actress Mabel Hite, his life changed for the better, and their love story captivated the nation. Donlin left baseball after his sensational comeback for the dramatic 1908 season and joined Mabel on the stage, likely losing a Hall of Fame career. Then in 1912, at the age of twenty-nine, Mabel died of intestinal cancer.

After making a final comeback as a player in 1914, Donlin starred in baseball’s first feature film. He became a drinking buddy of actors John Barrymore and Buster Keaton and married actress Rita Ross. The couple moved to Hollywood, where Donlin became a beloved figure and appeared in roughly one hundred movies, mostly in minor roles. Despite his Hollywood career, Donlin stayed connected to the game he loved and was seeking a coaching job with the Giants when he died of a heart attack in 1933. At the dawn of the celebrity era of sports, Donlin was one of the nation’s first athletes to capture the public’s attention. This biography by Steve Steinberg and Lyle Spatz shows why.

Steve Steinberg is a baseball historian and author of Urban Shocker: Silent Hero of Baseball’s Golden Age (Nebraska, 2017), winner of the SABR Baseball Research Award, and The World Series in the Deadball Era. Lyle Spatz is the author of many baseball books and the coauthor (with Steve Steinberg) of The Colonel and Hug: The Partnership that Transformed the New York Yankees (Nebraska, 2015), winner of the SABR Baseball Research Award, and 1921: The Yankees, the Giants, and the Battle for Baseball Supremacy in New York (Nebraska, 2010), winner of the Seymour Medal.

List of Illustrations
Acknowledgments
Historical Notes
Part 1. Mike before Mabel
1. Growing Up with Tragedy
2. “I’m Going to Be a Sensation in Baseball”
3. The Making of Mike Donlin
4. “Provided He Takes Care of Himself”
5. Donlin and McGraw Battle with American League Umpires
6. A Brutal Assault
7. A Return to the National League
8. “A Manager Who Can’t Control Himself”
9. “I Am Through with Donlin!”
10. Goodbye to Cincinnati; Hello to Broadway
11. “I Guess I Have Had My Share of Trouble”
12. Mathewson Pitches the Giants to a World Series Title
13. The New York Hoodlums
Part 2. Mabel
14. Vaudeville, America’s Other National Pastime
15. A Star Is Born
16. Mabel Meets Mike
Part 3. Mike and Mabel
17. A Season Interrupted
18. Chicago, Their Kind of Town
19. Mabel Tells Mike: Become a Changed Man—or Else
20. The Prodigal Returns
21. The Most Popular Ballplayer in New York
22. A Pennant Race Like No Other
23. Stealing Home
24. Will He or Won’t He?
25. I Play for the Money
26. Despite Health Concerns, Mabel’s Star Continues to Rise
27. A Return to Baseball
28. A Trade to Pittsburgh
29. Tragic End of a Loving Partnership
Part 4. Mike after Mabel
30. Life Goes On
31. Remarriage and a Final Return to the Major Leagues
32. Mike Enters the New World of Motion Pictures
33. Memphis Blues
34. Back on Broadway and Hollywood Calls
35. “The Very Breath of Life”
36. Acting Success and a Mysterious Illness
37. “Lights, Camera, Action” Continues to the End
38. A Life Well Lived
Notes
Bibliography
Index

Erscheinungsdatum	27.03.2024
Zusatzinfo	34 photographs, 3 illustrations, index
Verlagsort	Lincoln
Sprache	englisch
Maße	152 x 229 mm
Themenwelt	Literatur ► Biografien / Erfahrungsberichte
	Kunst / Musik / Theater
	Sachbuch/Ratgeber ► Sport ► Ballsport
	Weitere Fachgebiete ► Sportwissenschaft
ISBN-10	1-4962-3896-6 / 1496238966
ISBN-13	978-1-4962-3896-2 / 9781496238962
Zustand	Neuware