Posted on 07/04/2009 10:32:07 AM PDT by Deo volente
It is easy to find a clip of the speech on YouTube, consisting of just a few short lines captured on a long ago day by the television cameras.
The Lou Gehrig we see in black and white at Yankee Stadium on July 4, 1939 is movie-star handsome: tall, seemingly strong, a New York Yankee through and through.
Joe McCarthy, the Yankees manager, takes Gehrig by the elbow and leads him to a bank of microphones behind home plate.
The crowd of 61,000 gets to its feet. The emotion in the moment is obvious. Gehrig - native New Yorker, two-time American League MVP, a multiple World Series winner and a Bronx Bombing legend - places his hands on his hips, a cap dangling from his fingers. He leans forward, and in the unmistakable accent of his hometown begins to speak.
"For the past two weeks, you have been reading about a bad break," Gehrig says. "Today, I consider myself the luckiest man on the face of the earth. That I might have been given a bad break, but I have an awful lot to live for."
(Excerpt) Read more at nationalpost.com ...
RIP.
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