February, 2021
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LAWRENCE S. KATZ- Author- And So Much More!
I am pleased to introduce you to my guest on Lessons Learned this Friday, February 12, 2021, when my friend Lawrence S. Katz talks BASEBALL
Lawrence S. Katz has written numerous articles about baseball for publications including Sports Collectors Digest, The Baseball Research Journal, and Primo Magazine. He contributed a chapter entitled “When Immortals Returned to the Minors” for The Perfect Game, an anthology published by the Taylor Publishing Company in 1993 and by Barnes & Noble in 1995.
This work is a revised edition of his book Baseball in 1939: The Watershed Season of the National Pastime, published by McFarland and Company in 1995 and 2012. The book, and his abstract titled “Baseball & Cultural Change in the Late 1930s,” are included in the Baseball Hall of Fame Library collection.
Katz has spoken on a variety of baseball subjects, including Depression Era baseball at the Baseball in Literature and Culture Symposium at Indiana State University, the recent return of minor league baseball to the Detroit area, and the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League – featured in the movie A League of their Own – at a dinner honoring former player Rose Gacioch.
He realized his dream of appearing on a major league pitching mound before a packed house when he sang the National Anthem with a choral group at Tiger Stadium in Detroit in 1988.
He has been a member of The Society for American Baseball Research since 1983.
Katz received his J.D. from Wayne State University Law School in 1972. He lives in Michigan with his wife, author Karen Tintori Katz.
https://www.facebook.com/Summer-of-Change-Baseball-in-1939-100624328292095/
Contact: LawrenceSKatz.Attorney@gmail.com
17 years ago today was not just another day –
I am not sure what this is all about
I woke and share a quick breakfast with my husband who had to attend a 3-day conference in Pittsburgh (for work)
The day and the date to celebrate our 1st of two wedding anniversaries on that day was postponed for another time
A 20th anniversary is a milestone but not for us at least on February 3rd.
He traveled to Pittsburgh and I went to work
The day felt as normal as a day could be – in the back of my mind I knew my father was experiencing his last days with us – but each night he would have my mom or his hospice nurse call to say, he would be around yet another day – no goodbyes!
Early in the evening after working and playing single mom, I spoke with mom and dad’s hospice nurse held the phone near my dad’s ear, and helped him talk to me (this would be the last time.)
Before they hung up his nurse (I have since forgotten her name), his guiding angel prepared me that his end was near.
My father had come close to the end of his journey numerous times in my life and bounced back – would this be the same scenario?
I don’t remember the exact time but sometime around 11 or midnight, I got the call …
My mother calmly told me that dad had passed and as I became emotional she told me there was no need, dad was now at peace…
My stoic mom stood tall (even at 4 Ft- 9 Inches high), she organized the events of the next few days getting all of her chickens (three of us) to Detroit and we came from East, West, and South!
After my mother’s phone call I remember looking at the clock and noting my POPs died on my 20th Wedding Anniversary
If he (or GOD) chose this day it could not be more perfect – because I know my father loved me with his whole heart
I was not a perfect daughter but I was his and along with my two brothers and my mom, his D’Vasha, he was the happiest richest man in the world.
I speak of him regularly and I speak to him through my heart –
A little aside – on February 4, 2004, all his children were gathered together sleeping in his apartment palace.
Mom and Dad Forever
Although not enough beds and private rooms for us we took up spaces on air mattresses, chairs, and found some personal real estate to lay down to sleep. When all the lights turned off my brother Joel yelled out good-night John Boy, and we all responded, calling out each other names giggling through it all.
On the first night of Shiva, just as we were gathered for evening prayers, the lights went out for a second or two and then flickered back on. A calm, as well as a giddiness, swept over all who stood in my mother’s small livingroom – we knew Jay Harmon Moss was shedding his light down on us.
Today – it is 17 years without him on earth and what I would give to have another bear hug and a sloppy kiss from my father – I will soak in all the wonderful memories and know someday I will see him again!
D5 Creation