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Associated Press
Lou Gehrig took to the bench May 2,
1939 as his teammates warmed up for
their game. (AP)
Lou Gehrig took to the bench May 2,
1939 as his teammates warmed up for
their game. (AP)
On this Day: Lou Gehrig Delivers ‘Luckiest Man’ Speech
July 04, 2008 6:00 AM
On July 4, 1939, in a farewell speech at Yankee Stadium, a terminally ill Lou Gehrig declared himself the “luckiest man on the face of the Earth.”
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Lou Gehrig was the Yankees’ star first baseman and cleanup hitter, playing in 2,130 consecutive games between 1925 and 1939. His streak ended on May 2 when, after weeks of feeling weak and lethargic, Gehrig removed himself from the lineup.
On June 19, doctors at the Mayo Clinic diagnosed Gehrig with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), a rare, incurable neurodegenerative disease. Doctors predicted he had just a few years to live.
Honoring Gehrig in an Independence Day ceremony between games of a doubleheader at Yankee Stadium, the team retired Gehrig’s uniform number. Former teammates and dignitaries came to pay tribute, and his team presented him with a trophy.
An emotional Gehrig spoke to the sellout crowd, saying, “Fans, for the past two weeks you have been reading about a bad break. Yet today I consider myself the luckiest man on the face of the Earth.”
He said he felt privileged to play alongside his teammates and that so many people—including the rival New York Giants—had presented him with gifts. Thanking his family, he praised his wife for showing “more courage than you dreamed existed.”
He finished, “I might have been given a bad break, but I’ve got an awful lot to live for.”
Gehrig traveled with the team for the remainder of the season and received special early admittance to the Baseball Hall of Fame.
On June 2, 1941, he succumbed to his illness, which has since become known as “Lou Gehrig’s disease.”
On June 19, doctors at the Mayo Clinic diagnosed Gehrig with amyotrophic lateral sclerosis (ALS), a rare, incurable neurodegenerative disease. Doctors predicted he had just a few years to live.
Honoring Gehrig in an Independence Day ceremony between games of a doubleheader at Yankee Stadium, the team retired Gehrig’s uniform number. Former teammates and dignitaries came to pay tribute, and his team presented him with a trophy.
An emotional Gehrig spoke to the sellout crowd, saying, “Fans, for the past two weeks you have been reading about a bad break. Yet today I consider myself the luckiest man on the face of the Earth.”
He said he felt privileged to play alongside his teammates and that so many people—including the rival New York Giants—had presented him with gifts. Thanking his family, he praised his wife for showing “more courage than you dreamed existed.”
He finished, “I might have been given a bad break, but I’ve got an awful lot to live for.”
Gehrig traveled with the team for the remainder of the season and received special early admittance to the Baseball Hall of Fame.
On June 2, 1941, he succumbed to his illness, which has since become known as “Lou Gehrig’s disease.”
Headline Link: Lou Gehrig Appreciation Day
“I saw strong men weep this afternoon, expressionless umpires swallow hard, and emotion pump the hearts and glaze the eyes of 61,000 baseball fans in Yankee Stadium,” wrote Washington Post columnist Shirley Povich. “It was Lou Gehrig, tributes, honors, gifts heaped upon him, getting an overabundance of the thing he wanted least—sympathy. But it wasn’t maudlin. His friends were just letting their hair down in their earnestness to pay him honor. And they stopped just short of a good, mass cry.”
Source: The Washington Post
Audio & Video: Gehrig’s ‘Farewell to Baseball’
American Rhetoric hosts a video and audio clips of Gehrig’s speech, as well as the full speech transcript.
Source: American Rhetoric
Key Player: Lou Gehrig
Gehrig joined the Yankees in 1923, and played in every game from 1925 to 1939. He was renowned for his powerful swing, which produced 493 home runs in an era where few homers were hit, and his quiet leadership.
Source: findingDulcinea
Background: ‘A bad break’
Gehrig began the 1939 season poorly, feeling mysteriously weak and struggling to make even simple fielding plays. On May 2, feeling that he was a hindrance to the team, he took himself out of the lineup.
Source: MLB.com
He left the team to seek treatment at Rochester, Minnesota’s Mayo Clinic. On June 19—his 36th birthday—the doctors informed Gehrig that he had amyotrophic lateral sclerosis. Gehrig was told that his muscles would slowly deteriorate over the next several years, until there “may be little more than skin & bone.” Gehrig refused to pity himself: “I guess I have to accept the bitter with the sweet. If this is the finish, I’ll take it.”
Source: Time
Later Developments: ‘An awful lot to live for’
Gehrig remained with the team for the rest of the 1939 season and watched from the bench as the Yankees won their fourth straight World Series. After the season, he was inducted in the Baseball Hall of Fame, which waived the five-year waiting period required for all players.
Source: The Baseball Hall of Fame
At the personal request of New York Mayor Fiorello La Guardia, Gehrig accepted a job as a New York City Parole Commissioner. He served until the spring of 1941, when he had become so weak that he could barely hold a pen.
Source: Living Legacie
On June 2, 1941, Gehrig died at the age of 37 in his Bronx home. Flags were flown at half mast in New York and in all major league ballparks in honor of one of baseball’s greatest players.
Source: findingDulcinea
“The Lou Gehrigs should not be rare. They should be the standard human type, for, after all, Lou was a simple soul, with no affectations, who didn’t have to work at being good and kind,” wrote Westbrook Pegler in the New York World-Telegram. “That was what it was that made Gehrig great above and beyond his size and achievements, and it is no credit to the breed that so many of us are so unlike this fine man that we must stand in such awe of his simple virtues.”
Source: Time
Reference: Lou Gehrig’s disease
Gehrig’s condition was a rare affliction known as amyotrophic lateral sclerosis, which later became known as Lou Gehrig’s disease after its most famous victim. Painless but ultimately debilitating, the disease attacks nerve cells in the brain and spine, resulting in a sudden loss of strength and eventually leads to paralysis. The Web site offers news and information, “stories of courage,” and an online ALS advocacy community, as well as resources for those coping with the disease.
Source: The Amyotrophic Lateral Sclerosis Association
© 2008 Dulcinea Media, Inc.
