Sport: Big Man from Nicetown

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For the next two years, the Dodgers came close—but never quite close enough —to another pennant. Campy, too, had good years and bad breaks. In September 1950 he grabbed at a foul tip and suffered a dislocation of his right thumb. That winter, the hot-water heater in his home blew up in his face. As the year wore on, Campy picked up a startling assortment of injuries: a split thumb from a foul ball hit by the Athletics' Eddie Joost in an exhibition game, a bruised hip (during a slide), a chipped elbow when Whitey Lockman of the Giants crashed into him. Still he played, and still he was the sparkplug of the team.

All through the third game of the memorable 1951 pennant playoff with the Giants, Campy kept ducking into the dugout toilet to pray for victory. When Bobby Thomson connected for his unbelievable, game-winning home run for the New York Giants, Campy swore at the soaring ball: "Sink, you devil, sink!" He kept muttering until the ball disappeared.

"Oh, What a Fella!" For Campy, 1952 was a slow year; he had a bad arm and his hitting was off. The Dodgers won the pennant, but once again they lost the World Series to the Yankees. In 1953, his arm healed, Campy went to town. He had the best hitting year for any catcher in the history of organized baseball. He caught 144 games (of 154 scheduled), got 162 hits, walloped 41 home runs, wound up with an average of .312 and the most-valuable-player award. Once more, the Yankees won the World Series.

Last season was Campy's worst ever. His left hand, hit by one of Yankee Allie Reynolds' World Series pitches, was badly bruised, and his batting average sank to .207. He wondered whether he would ever play again. After a while, the hand was partially paralyzed. This spring, after an operation, he was back. Two fingers of his left hand were still stiff, but, said he: "I can curl them around a bat handle, and that's what counts." At a gathering of baseball writers not long ago, the grand ballroom of New York's Waldorf-Astotfia resounded with a special song in his honor (to the tune of O Sole Mio):

Oh, Campanella, oh, he'sa my boy, Oh, what a fella, dat mighty Roy!

Old Peg. To the big, beaming man from Nicetown, life has become a lot nicer than it used to be in the old "bus-league" days. With his $45,000-a-year Dodger salary, plus $10,000 or so more from his Harlem liquor store and some extra folding money from cigarette endorsements, Campy can afford steak every day instead of bologna.

For his wife and six kids, Campy has bought a comfortable home in a prosperous section of St. Albans, L.I. He tends the backyard rose garden himself, officiates at the outdoor barbecue, is never too busy on afternoons at home to play catch with his three boys. Indoors, the large house is cramped with Campy's hobbies. A vast and valuable collection of toy trains clutters the attic; an entire wall of the basement den is covered with carefully tended aquariums of expensive tropical fish. Once the conversation swings around to the bright little creatures, Campy actively resents a change of topic —even to baseball.