Hank Greenberg was born at 16 Barrow Street in Greenwich Village on New Years Day in 1911. My limited research found that he lived there till he was 7ish. I have never looked for a players childhood home or gravesite before. There isn't really much gained by the endeavor in this case. The building appears to currently be an apartment building. It is in a sort of old residential street - There are several row homes on the other side of the street which also include a tavern and a few other shops.
Beyond the marker presented above there isn't anything else noting the location or Hank Greenberg's accomplishments.
This is the home photographed from across the street. The house was easy to find, it is in the West Village between Bleeker and 4th streets - Bleeker is a pretty significant street in the village. There is a subway stop on 4th street near Sheridan Square park, which is about 2 blocks from the Greenberg house.
Hank Greenberg Hall of Famer
Greenberg was elected to the Hall in 1956. He was a member of two Detroit Tigers World Champions (1935, 1945). His post season numbers are impressive 5 Homers, 22 RBIs in 85 ABs over four World Series (23 Games) .318 BA .624 SLG. Hank was a 2 time MVP (1935, 1940), He led the league in Homers and RBIs 4 times. His career 331 Homers would have likely been even better had Greenberg not lost 3 seasons to WWII. The five time all-star finished his career with a .313 BA/.412 OBP
Even with all these great baseball accomplishments Hank Greenberg is likely best known for being one of the first great Jewish athletes. His story is told in the film in the documentry The Life and Times of Hank Greenberg.
The Plaque
People may claim that you can find anything on the internet. Well I can dispute this. The Greenberg Birthplace Plague gives little information about it's history. It wasn't placed by New York State or City or the Baseball Hall of Fame or any other organization near as I can tell. There are two names noted as Doners on the plague on the plague, John Culkin and L M Brooks. There is a Dr John M Culkin who taught at Harvard and appears to be a bit of a baseball fan, but I could not totally connect him to the marker. LM Brooks proved to be to vague a name to research.
There are not a lot of Hank Greenberg retro cards floating around out there. Tristar has a few cards of him in their Obak line including the 2010 Mini above. There are no recent finished auctions for this card, among other Minis from 2010 Obak that were sold the prices ranged from 64 cents (Starlin Castro) to $5 for Ray Chapman. There were several NSCC exclusive minis that went for significantly higher prices - especially Mike Trout, but I really don't consider those cards part of the 2010 Obak set.
.
No comments:
Post a Comment