The Real Most Interesting Man in the World

[DOUGHBOYS]

The most interesting man in the world is dead.
There's been a song written about him.
There's been a book written about him.
He was a scholar. He was a spy. He was a baseball player.
He's not the guy in the beer ads.
He is Moe Berg.

Moe Berg was crazy smart. He started school at three and a half because he was bored.
He graduated high school at 16.
He went to Princeton.
He skipped spring training with the White Sox one year so he could finish his first year of law school at Columbia.

During all the scholarly pursuits, Moe played baseball.
Berg was never the best player on any of his teams. But his aptitude for being at the right place at the right time was always a big help wherever he played in the field. Moe was extraordinary in that he played every hitting position well through high school and into College.
He was slow afoot and didn't hit much, but the uncanny abilities in the field were unparalled.
During his Freshman year at Princeton, Princeton was undefeated.
Princeton would have good teams during his other years as well.
As a Senior, he was the leader of the club and was named Captain.
Harvard, Yale, and Princeton had a 'Big Three' round-robin tourney at Yankee Stadium in 1923 and Moe shined brightly, even smacking the ball all over the yard.
Brooklyn and the New York Giants both offered him contracts.
Moe chose Brooklyn.

Moe played for Brooklyn the very next day and stayed with the club the rest of the year.
During the off season he sailed to Paris. It was rumored that this may have been the time that Moe was approached by the O.S.S. The O.S.S. is the Office of Strategic Services, which would later be re-named the CIA.
While in Paris, Moe took 32 classes and began a lifetime daily habit of reading at least 10 newspapers.
Berg was fluent in 10 languages and the newspapers spanned the globe for him.
A teammate would later joke that, "Berg is fluent in 10 different languages, and can't hit in any of them."

Moe's lack of hitting bought him a ticket to the minors. He kicked around the minors and took the place of a shortstop who refused to pay a $10 fine for poor play. (Can you imagine that being the case, now?)
It was while playing with Toledo that a scout wrote the now famous line to his front office describing Moe's play...
"Good Field, No Hit"

Berg's fortunes would change though when he hit .311 and knocked in 124 runs in the International League.
TheWhite Sox bought his option and he was to report to them for spring training.
Berg sent them a note however informing them that he would conclude the first year at law school before joining the team.
By the time Berg arrived to the team, they had a shortstop that was playing well and Berg became a benched utility man.
In 1927, the same thing happened. Berg sent a message to the White Sox that he would be late reporting to the club while finishing his second year of law school.
After this, Columbia made special arrangements with Moe to take extra classes during fall to finish Law School.
Berg never used his law school degree for a profession needing this degree.

1927 began the same as '26 for Berg, a lot of bench sitting.
Then in August, the White Sox did not have a catcher. Their first string and second string catcher went out of the game with minor injury and Ray Schalk the Player/Manager who thought of himself as the emergency catcher was also hurt.
Schalk asked for volunteers.
Moe raised his hand and said he'd caught a few games at Princeton.
This moment ended Berg's role as a utility player.
He would put on the tools of ignorance in 532 of his next 533 games.
Still, his hitting held him back and he would really only be considered a first string catcher one year, 1929.

During off seasons, Berg would continue doing 'un-baseball player like activities. Roaming the world, it was not a surprise for him to see Babe Ruth or another current player on a cruise thousands of miles away from America.
While Berg would think it was nice to see a superstar from his sport traveling abroad, the superstar would be wondering how a second string catcher could afford to travel so much during the off season.

In 1932, Moe went on a baseball seminar trip with pitchers Ted Lyons and Lefty O'Doul
Lyons and O'Doul thought of the trip as a vacation with a little teaching of baseball to the Japanese who were relatively new to the sport.
O'dOUL was astonished that he would hardly see Moe beyond the seminars. Berg was always taking pictures and would be in the 'non-tourist' areas of Japan.
While the O'Doul family and Lyons family went back to America after the seminar, Moe toured nine other countries before the next baseball season opened.

Two years later, another Japanese trip. This one a tour of all-stars including Babe Ruth, Lou Gehrig, Jimmie Foxx, Charlie Gehringer, Lefty Gomez and others.
Oh, and Moe Berg also got an invitation at the last moment.
Moe was never an All-Star.
Berg was armed with a Bell and Howell movie projector and a note from Movietone News that he was to 'film sights' on his trip.
Being fluent in Japanese, Berg gave the welcome speech and even addressed the Japanese Legislature.
He missed a lot of games.
Whereabouts unknown.
Once on the trip, he was standing near some docks when Lefty Gomez was walking his way, before Gomez could greet him, Berg whispered, "Lefty, just keep walking by me like you don't know me.
He never told Lefty why.
But he did ask for some of the pictures that Gomez wife had taken while on a local cruise.
One day while the All-Stars were to play in a game, Moe excused himself in saying that he needed to visit the daughter of a U.S. Ambassador in the hospital.
The hospital was one of the tallest structures in that community and Moe was seen taking pictures from its rooftop.
The photographs taken by Berg and other photo's obtained on the trip were instrumental in co-ordinates for bombing raids during World War II.
It was during this trip that Moe was informed of his unconditional release from the Indians.
Moe continued traveling to the Phillipines, Korea, and Moscow.

Moe got a job with the Red Sox and would be their second stringer for five years.
He would continue to travel the world in the off sesason.
In 1939, he gained notariety.
Maybe too much for someone so 'secretive'.
He appeared on a radio quiz show.
After missing the first question, audiences became riveted to the show, amazed at Berg's knowledge of every subject under the sun.
Kenesaw 'Mountain' Landis, the Commisioner of baseball told Moe that he had done more for baseball in 30 minutes than he had done as Commisioner of baseball.
Audiences and the radio executives wanted to know more about Berg. He had become a phenom. When confronted with more personal questions on the third radio show, Berg excused himself and never appeared on that or any radio show again.
Scholars would scoff at Berg for being a mere baseball player. Playing a game that hooligans like Babe Ruth could play.
Berg responded,"I'd rather be a baseball player than a Supreme Court Justice!"

Moe's playing career ended in 1939. He coached for the Red Sox for two years.
Then, Pearl Harbor and World War II, and his baseball career was over.
For Phineus and Ferb viewers, Berg's 'Perry the Platypus' years were done.
Berg accepted a position with Nelson Rockefeller's Office of Inter-American Affairs. Big words for a group whose task was to counter Italian and German propaganda in Latin America.
With this, Berg was sent worldwide on other missions.
The most well known of these missions was being sent to Switzerland to discover how much progress Germany had made in building an atomic bomb.
There were many accounts of his exploits this trip.
In the book, 'Heisenberg's War' by Thomas Powers, Moe was to attend a lecture given by Werner Heisenberg, with instructions to kill Heisenberg if it sounded like he was getting too close in the making of the bomb.
After the lecture, he struck up a conversation with Heisenberg and they walked and talked on city streets.
All while Moe had a loaded gun at the ready, leading Heisenberg in questions, while questioning himself in pulling the trigger. He decided that Heisenberg was not close and the decision never had to be made.

After World War II, the OSS turned into the CIA.
Stuffy suits and streamlined rules were the way.
A way that didn't strike the fancy of Moe Berg.
Moe Berg quit.
What'd he do next with his life?
Moe Berg with all of his aptitude, a degree from Princeton, a law degree from Columbia, and fluent in 10 languages did nothing.
His friends and family suspected that he was still spying. Everything he did, had a secretive approach.
He lived at these same friends and families residences while not working any type of visible job.
He died 25 years after the war ended.

Moe Berg is not in the Hall of Fame.
He doesn't deserve to be.
But, he was the most interesting man in the world.
And if ever in Washington D.C. and you get a chance to visit the CIA headquarters.
Do it.
There is one baseball card displayed prominently in their display case.
It is not that of any of the playoff qualifying Washington Nationals.
It is a baseball card of Moe Berg.

Next time you see one of those beer commercials.
Take a beer by the hand and say, 'This one's for you, Moe!'
The REAL most interesting man in the world.

[Raskol]

Very cool! Thanks again....

[low talkers]

My friend Chuck Brodsky wrote a song about Moe Berg. Is that the song you mentioned? Have you heard it? Chuck is a fantastic singer/songwriter who writes a lot of baseball songs, and I had never heard of Moe Berg until that song. Chuck is quite a baseball historian, and I had never thought about it until now but he is kind of a Doughboy with a guitar. Great stuff as always.

[DOUGHBOYS]

Thanks.
Dave, that is the very song that I talked about!
If I were any good at computers, I'd give you the link. It is easier for me just to tell you how to see it.
Go to YouTube and type 'Chuck Brodsky Mo Berg'.
Since you know him, tell him for me he did a great job.

There really should be a movie about this guy. An incredible life.

[DOUGHBOYS]

My favorite line about Moe Berg was from a player who found out later that Berg was a spy during his baseball years.
He said, "For 18 years, Moe Berg got to know just about every player who played the game, yet, at the same time, not one player got to know Moe Berg."
I think it was Lefty Gomez who said it, but can't be sure.
Perfect.