The Hardin tribune-herald. [volume] (Hardin, Mont.) 1925-1973, 1937-10-22

KIBO PARK in Hoboken, N. j.,
is the home grounds of the
- Eastern League Buckaroos. But
baseball is the fact that it is a
National League Titan rookie farm.
From it come tomorrow's stars, break
ing into the top circuit after the in
evitable two years professional seasOn
ing 1t takes to change a rookie into a
major league player, no matter how
good a natural" he is.
To it drop veterans on their way out
Of active baseball. champions still from
n shoulders up, but old men, as
athletes go, with rubber legs and CO.
ordination a shade too SLOW for con-
tinued competition in fast company.
On that clear, cold April day, a
week before the opening of the season,
1t was a picture, a cacaphony of sound
and a mass OF moving color. There was
the crack of bat against ball, the thud
Of ball against glove, the swishing
ground, the sharp bark of coaches i'm
pacting eerily on the cold air. There
were men in baseball uniforms work.
ing all over the triangular field in a
frame of stands and scoreboards and
huge advertising signs. And their car
pet was new green and brown and their
ceiling was the cold blue sky.
And the three Leatherns, each &C
cording to his age and each in his
own way, bent their thoughts and
efforts to what they all hoped would
be a third blooming of their twice.
famous name.
Old Denis Leathern, head Of the clan,
sire Of one, grandsire of the other, sat
slightly dimmed old eyes at the group
of pitchers. You'd hardly suspect his
10 years. He was so big -shouldered and
lithely built. He was the shell, an ex-
pert in physical manhood might say,
of a fine athlete, a professional fighter.
he would Immediately add at sight of
his cauliflowered left ear. And he
would have been right.
Denis Leathern in his day was a
great fighter. His day lasted from
November, 1885, when he climbed
through the ropes of a ring set up on
a barge to Highland whip The Lon
don Killer with bare knuckles, until
January, 1897, when Bob Fitzsimmons
smashed everything, but his great
heart in his last fight.
In those IL years he met the best of
them and won 81 of his So fights.
Your grandfathers-or maybe it's your
Observation-Disclosures remember him.
He was called THE Tyrone Phantom"
because of his birth in northern Ire
loA4O d41o CSduo LID opCCu "do ~
elusive and his hard hands so punish
ing. Denis, first of the Leatherns, who
married Maggie Dwyer, the pretty
music hall dancer.
So he sat there in the dugout and
looked out on two others so like him
that they might have been his triplet
brothers, if they had not been Pat
Leathern, his son, and Shane Leathern,
his grandson.
Do YOU have to be told of Pat
Leathern?
We'll, maybe you don't care for base
ball or maybe you don't read the
newspapers. If you do either, you can't
have missed him. The papers were
full of him during the 1928 World
series. He won the deciding game for
the Titans with three doubles and a
single. But let's take a quick look at
the record books anyway.
Pat Leathern, the only child of Denis,
the pugilist and Maggie Dryer, the
dancer, had been in baseball, man and
boy, for 26 years. He was ID and just
graduated from high school when he
was signed by Aurora and he went
from there to the Boston Braves the
next year, 1912.
He was big and 1.-THE like his father
then, but not so calm. Turbulent, Pat
was, aggressive and with a biting wit.
He was an umpire batter. He was a
slugger. In 1914, he batted 1856. In his
&c years he played with four National
"