Summer of '68

by Wendel, Tim

• ISBN13: 9780306820182
• ISBN10: 0306820188
• Format: Hardcover
• Copyright: 2012-03-13
• Publisher: Da Capo Pr

Summary

For baseball fans, 1968 was The Year of the Pitcher. The season was dominated by such legends as Don Drysdale, Denny McLain, Luis Tiant, and Bob Gibson. But it was also a season shaped by national tragedy and sweeping change, rocked by the assassinations of Martin Luther King, Jr. and Robert Kennedy, and shaken by the violence that erupted at the Democratic National Convention in Chicago and the riots that raged throughout the summer. For a select few players, the conflicts of '68 would spur their performance to remarkable heights, elevating the game around them. And in Detroit--which had burned just the summer before during the worst riot in American history--the city rallied behind a Tigers team that would face off against Bob Gibson's St. Louis Cardinals, the defending champions, in an amazing World Series for the ages. Soon everything would change--for baseball and America. But for this one unforgettable season, the country was captivated by the national pastime at the moment it needed the game most.