Quantcast
Channel: Stories
Viewing all articles
Browse latest Browse all 15

Harry "The Horse" Danning

0
0

One afternoon at my home in L.A., the doorbell rang. Standing on my doorstep was 88-year-old, Harry "The Horse" Danning, the four-time All-Star catcher for the New York Giants of the 1930s. (They were World Champs in 1933 and National League Champs in 1936 and 1937, with players such as Mel Ott, Carl Hubbell, Bill Terry and Travis Jackson.) Danning had written a letter for one of my Baseball Letters books and promised to drop by when in L.A. (his hometown).

He came into my house, this hulking man, and sat down in my big, red retro 1960s chair. I asked him if I could film his reminiscences. I had a ton of questions, loving baseball history as I do. He said, "Sure."

He then proceeded to talk about being the man behind the plate when Lou Gehrig hit his final World Series home run and when Joe Dimaggio hit his first one. He was also behind the plate when Ted Williams won the 1941 All-Star game with a towering blast. (He was still upset that pitcher Claude Passeau didn't throw the pitch that Danning wanted him to!)

He told personal stories of Jimmie Foxx, Dizzy Dean and his colorful Gas House Gang Cardinals and poor Willard Herschberger, who took his own life three days after one of Danning's home runs beat Hershberger's Reds.

He described card games on the long, yet relaxing train rides, being one of four Jewish players on the Giants in those years and how he didn't even know his own real last name!

It was an amazing afternoon, an old man telling a young man the "way that it was." The day was capped when I showed him his jersey from 1941 that I had in my collection. He signed it, "Harry 'The Horse' Danning."

A few years later, I opened the New York Times to see that Danning had passed away at the age of 93. I realized then that he was the last Giant from those 1930s championship teams to pass away. I remembered the footage that I took of him and started to re-watch it. I decided to make it into a small movie as a memento of that afternoon and something that I could give to Danning's family. I interspliced some rare photos and films of Harry taken during his playing days, along with Al Jolsen's version of I'm Just Wild About Harry.

I titled the short film The Last Giant. Incredibly, it was just chosen as a Finalist for the D.C. International Film Festival to be held in March, 2007.

As a collector of historic baseball memorabilia, I love being around all-things historic when it comes to the game of baseball and I was certainly surrounded by it when I was fortunate enough to spend a few hours with "The Horse," Harry Danning.


Viewing all articles
Browse latest Browse all 15

Latest Images

Trending Articles





Latest Images