Saturday, January 18, 2014

Book Review: Before the Curse


One of the Christmas presents from my parents was the book Before the Curse, the Chicago Cubs' Glory Years by Roberts and Cunningham.

Stop your snickering.....yes, the Cubs did have some glory years.

Sure, they were over 100 years ago, but they were still glory years.

Over this 75 year period, the Cubs won the pennant in 1876, 1880, 1881, 1882, 1885, 1886, 1906, 1907, 1908, 1910, 1918, 1929, 1932, 1935, 1938, and 1945.

The sixteen league titles were more than any other team in the National League over that time span.  Yes, glory years.

The book traces the franchise's history, starting with the 1870 team that was a part of the National Association, to the team's winning inaugural National League pennant in 1876, to the turn of the century teams that won four pennants (and two World Series crowns) in five years, to the last pennant in 1945.

The author's tell about the various teams, and much of the information in there isn't new.  The twist with the book is that it also uses actual newspaper accounts from the events to add to the story.

The information in those clippings makes for an interesting read.  You get to hear the stories in the voices of actual witnesses to the events.  Most of these were new to me.

The 262-page book was a fairly easy read and fairly informative, too.

Now that I've read the book, I'll anxiously await the sequel, After the Curse, the Chicago Cubs' Glory Years 2014 - 2044 that will tell me the story of the sixteen pennants they won since Ricketts/Theo took over the team.

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