I was surfing Baseball Reference when I stumbled upon an odd player. One Harry Ruby had played one game for the Hollywood Stars in 1932, one for Hollywood in 1935, and one for the Los Angeles Angels in 1940. He was 37 in 1932, and 45 by the end of his career. This called for an explanation, so I googled him. He turned out to be a Hollywood composer and screenwriter who had dreamed of being a pro ball player, but when his dreams failed him went to Hollywood. This worked out pretty well for him, but he still felt the lure of the diamond. He wasn't much of a player, but his passion was to work out with big league teams. He would travel all over the U.S working out with teams, and for years he would join the Pirates in their spring training camp in San Bernardino.
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| Ruby in 1945 |
In 1941 he pinch ran in an exhibition game between the Coast League All-Stars and the Major League All-Stars, which was won by the Coast Leaguers 6-4. In 1947 he was also practicing with Pacific Coast League teams every Sunday. He appeared in the annual game between the Comedians and Leading Men for the benefit of the Mount Sinai Hospital from at least 1935 to 1938. In 1947 he was practicing with Pacific Coast League teams every Sunday, but he retired after that season. He was 52.
In 1950 a movie was made, "Three Little Words", about him and his song-writing partner Bert Kalmar. Though he didn't play himself, he appeared in a couple of baseball scenes, and was, in the words of the Los Angeles Evening Citizen News, "probably the only man who has ever played somebody else in his own film biography."
So that's the story of Harry Ruby, screenwriter and baseball fanatic. There's probably more I could find, but I've spent enough time researching a screenwriter.
Here's a funny story involving Ruby: In the days when future Angels' batting coach Jimmie Reese was playing in the Pacific Coast League, he participated in a celebrity game. Harry (Rubenstein) Ruby was the opposing pitcher. Ike Danning, major league catcher and brother of Harry Danning of the New York Giants, was catching and instead of bothering with signals he called out the pitches in Yiddish, figuring no one would understand. Reese went four-for-four that day, and after the game Ruby told Reese that he didn't know he was such a good hitter. "You also didn't know," Reese replied, "that my name was Hymie Soloman."
