| CUBS WIN!
The Chicago Cubs defeat the Detroit Tigers in the 1908 World Series.
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| The World Series Champion Chicago Cubs |
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As the 2008 baseball season starts we must ask ourselves a question. Is this "the year" for the Chicago Cubs? It has been 100 years since the Cubbies won the World Series. Now, I grew up in Chicago. But I was a White Sox fan. I did enjoy going to Wrigley Field as a youth, but it was the Sox that I rooted for. And the White Sox have won a World Series recently.
Over the last century nothing much has changed for Cubs' fans. They love their Cubs. They pray for their Cubs. They watch as their beloved Cubs make a run for it. Then they watch in horror as the Cubs... well there's only one way to put it... play like the Cubs. And they have gotten close. In 1969 the Miracle Mets came out of nowhere and dashed all hope. Then came 2003. The year it would finally happen. They were actually chilling the Champagne in the locker room. The Cubs were leading the Marlins 3 - 0 in the eighth. Five outs to go and the Cubs would go to the World Series. I can't tell you what happened. Even as a White Sox fan it hurts too much to re-live what happened. Look it up for yourselves. Yes, nothing much has changed for Cubs' fans in the last hundred years. But life in the U.S. has undergone some change.
The last time the Cubs won the World Series there were 46 states in the Union. Butch Cassidy and The Sundance Kid were killed in Bolivia. Henry Ford produced his first Model T. Buddy Ebsen, T.V.'s Jed Clampett, was born. The Boy Scouts of America was founded. The annual income was $900. William Howard Taft defeated William Jennings Bryan for the presidency. You could get a good Prime Rib for 14 cents a pound and 12 cents would get you a pound of coffee. If you read the daily paper, it would cost you a penny. D. W. Griffith directed his first film, "The Adventures of Dollie." Mother's Day was observed on May 10th... for the first time. And the Cubs' fans had reason to celebrate.
That was one hundred years ago. Every adult who saw the Cubs win... is dead. If you were ten years old and remember the victory, you're 110 years old as I write this. So I'm going to say this now. As a die-hard White Sox fan, and it's difficult for me to say............ GO CUBBIES!
Steve Rudnick
4/1/08
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