Show WE WERE TEAMMATES BECAUSE WE HAD TO BE C id We Be Maio? - -- In this era of heightened racial sensitivity marked by bias crimes on one hand and on the other by inspiring efforts at understanding this article—adapted from David Halberstam's book "October 1964" to be published next week by Villarrl —tells a story from an earlier time of racial tension when the civil rights struggle was being played out in our streets It is the story of the friendship between a young white Southerner and a fiercely proud black man a friendship forged on the playing field but one that transcended the confines of any stadium It is an American story A true story A story of their time—for our time I -1 I : - tp1 - - ' ' '''' 14 "-- etr! ) orm -t 4: 1 ' I ( ) ""1-4114- - ) l'' lg 1 1-rk - i I t k 6 : -- ' - '' ib- 1 -i" y '7--"'- - Ir ''1e)- 1 11 COVER PHOTOGRAPH - -- d I - i-- - --- ''''- s::'' it finally becoming friends And how - - --' — -- - ' —--- r j :- --- - - 'I '''''7:: t ' A 01 I - i' g ::—'-g- z: "-- ' ''-- -4 -- - - it 'Le-- ! z 11 ell A - I IN 31 : '2 - - r t p: A P ' f' -- I !'i f k' :s- i4 - r" ' - r ''': '" 4' :3: - - - """'''''t - ' 1 Ik it ' - -- " - A - 4 ' ' — ''':' :47 - c!4 — - ' " "- - 411--- ' --- - : 14'z — - - '-- 't ---- s 6- '''i l'' 0 P : ' i- - I c ''' t - S - 1 f if ''' t V - with an enduring mutual admiration and rust a friendship which far transcended the more limited confines of professional baseball where friendship could often be casual and hierarchical and the best player on the team often was assumed to be the most popular If Gibson was as some teammates thought a kind of samurai warrior on the mound that was more rue than most people suspected For he was a samurai in many ways not just in his DAVID - ' z l- -c 7—4r-----0- t i is'''' iI lk''' -- :- BY 4 g ' d and with an alnating most singular instinct for the weakness of others Simmons equally admired McCarver whom he thought of as Dog —not an ordinary dog but a violent junkyard dog utterly fearless almost violent in protecting his tenitory scrapping for every inch of turf a player reaching again and again beyond his natural abilities They were eventnAlly to become the best of friends McCarver and Gibson - - ' '"a 'P' : i NW J- pf'-- le ' o' - ' - '' i it - "s:"— ----- - w 4047 '2'-'I-gz 01 ' - I 44P44--- ' - '''' '' 1 1 single-minde- 4- 4": -- --- - 1 - ' ' '' - - - - - 4' - - - - ' '4' ':' '' i ''' ' ' — -- - - - - tode t-- -1 t -S - - 4-Ar- - teammates and bat- teryraates but more and more they were BY UPPBETTMANN 7:--- : -- that becoming season not just —predatory - ----- WERE Bob Gibson worked out his relationship with Tim McCarver was of no small social interest on the St Louis Cardinal team in the early 160s as both the sport of baseball and the nation itself faced dramatic racial challenge and change They were two of the strongest and most competitive players on the team and each was coming of age professionally—Tim McCarver white son of a Memphis policeman and Bob Gibson fiercely proud child of a harsh boyhood in the black Omaha ghetto Each was in his own way the most driven of athletes baseball was not merely a game but an extension of their will and their very being Ted Simmons a catcher who came to the Cardinals a few years later was intrigued by the two of them He Wolf thought of Gibson admiringly as dorai loyal powerful I - t -- 'HEY : - - v 1 t f' search for excellence and his uncommon need to dominate hitters Rather he was a man who lived by a code For him friendship was not just based on ability it also was based on what kind of a man a teammate was how he treated others—not just what he said he believed in but what he really believed in McCarver six years younger was still in the process of establishing himself as the regular catcher for both the Carriirmls and Gibson in the 1964 sea HALBERSTAM PAGE 4 - JULY 24 1994 - PARADE MAGAZINE |