Hank Greenberg: The Hero of Heroes by John Rosengren (review)

In Hank Greenberg: The Hero of Heroes, John Rosengren affirms and augments the case for his protagonist’s status as a central figure in baseball and Jewish-American history. Save for a final season with the Pittsburgh Pirates, the first basemen-outfielder spent his major league playing career (1930, 1933-1941, 1945-1947) as a Detroit Tiger. Due to four-and-half years of World War II military service and injuries, Greenberg’s on-field career constituted the equivalent of only nine full seasons. Nonetheless, Greenberg led the American League in both home runs and runs batted in four times, received two Most Valuable Player awards, paced the Tigers to four pennants, recorded a career .313 batting average, and earned election to the Hall of Fame. As Rosengren emphasizes, however, attention to Greenberg’s Jewishness during America’s most virulent period of anti-Semitism gives his baseball achievements an import beyond sport.

Rosengren pursues an objective neither articulated nor pursued by his predecessors, a definitive and comprehensive biography of baseball’s first Jewish superstar encompassing Greenberg’s entire life (1911-1986). Three notable biographical works on Greenberg preceded Rosengren’s volume. Hank Greenberg: The Story of My Life (1989), the ballplayer’s own memoir, remains incomplete and sometimes inconsistent, the result of the old slugger battling kidney cancer as he dictated into a tape recorder. Ira Berkow, Pulitzer Prizewinning New York Times columnist, edited Greenberg’s reminisces and provided insightful connective commentary but resisted turning the memoir into a biography. Aviva Kempner’s documentary film The Life and Times of Hank Greenberg (1999) tellingly captures the conversations and consciousness of the generation of Jews who came of age with Greenberg in the 1930s and 1940s. The film, nonetheless, offers only modest montage concerning Greenberg’s life after his 1947 retirement from active play. Mark Kurlansky’s Hank Greenberg: The Hero Who Didn’t Want to Be One (2011) posits that the ballplayer, rejecting religious and ethnic tribalism, provided a role model for all people facing discrimination. With only 148 pages of text, the Kurlansky biography constitutes an instructive introduction to the Greenberg story rather than a full life-and-times account.

Rosengren does give priority to Greenberg’s baseball years, providing details that illuminate time and place, deftly capturing the rhythms and drama of specific seasons, games, and at bats. Nonetheless, Rosengren limns the full arc of Greenberg’s life course and places it within the context of Jewish, American, and world history. The supporting cast of characters—family, romantic partners, friends, teammates, rival players, managers, team owners, sportswriters—receive their due. Rosengren delved deeply into the primary and secondary sources. In addition to conducting original interviews and scouring contemporary newspapers and magazines, Rosengren obtained Greenberg’s military records, divorce proceedings, Federal Bureau of Investigation file, employment data, and personal correspondence. At times, the vividness of Rosengren’s writing creates a novelistic intimacy.

Although Rosengren endorses the traditional view of Greenberg as a symbolic hero, the author presents revelations that add nuance, flawed humanity, and complexity to that interpretation. During one off-season, Greenberg worked for the Ford Motor Company investigating “subversive activities” (p. 142) despite Henry Ford’s anti-Semitic and anti-labor practices. Greenberg maintained a friendship with the notorious Jewish gangster Abe Bernstein, a leader of Detroit’s Purple Gang. Greenberg strongly advocated player rights and the integration of baseball, evidenced by his encouragement to Jackie Robinson and testimony supporting Curt Flood’s fight against the reserve clause. However, as general manager of the Cleveland Indians, Greenberg kept player salaries down, and alienating Larry Doby, the first black to play in the American League, and Jewish third baseman Al Rosen, amongst others. Leveraging knowledge of his wife’s adultery, Greenberg secured full custody of their three children as part of his divorce from department store heiress Caral Gimbel.

Greenberg’s relationship with Judaism threads through the biography. Indeed, the book begins with a rendition of Greenberg...