The Real Dope

in France

supper dread 0 doing nothing since we been in the war and they say they can't do nothing till the German navy comes out and that's what they're waiting for. Well Al that's a good deal like waiting for the 30nd. of Feb. or for Jennings to send his self up to hit for Cobb and they can say all they want about the Germans being bullet proof from the neck up bu

all over France but if they was a baseball league between the towns where they have got us billeted the fans would get blear eyed looking at the no game sign and if a mgr. worked their pitchers

e they give them now I would stand them under a shower bath with their close on about 1/2 the time and when it come time for a hike I would send them

is folks and a married couple of every kind of animals in the world and they wasn't drownded because Noah had a Ark for them to get in out of the wet. Well Noahs Ark is a good name

ragged but I wished they had of gave us steel helmets wide enough so as they would make a

pal,

in France

. by the Frenchmens for what they have pulled off and the way they work it Al when one of the soldiers wrists his life or something and pulls off something big like takeing a mess of prisoners and bringing them back here where they can get

d "Well I guess I will win as many of them as you will win." That shut him up for a wile but finely he says "You have got enough chest to wear a whole junk shop on it." So I said "Well I am not the baby that can't win them." So he says "If you ever happen to be snooping around the bosh trenchs when F

don't seem like they even try to learn and I suppose its because they figure the war is in their country so everybody should ought to talk their language but when you get down to cases they's a big job on both our hands and if one of us has got to talk the others language why and the he--ll should they pick on the one that's hard to learn it and besides its 2 to I you might say because the U. S. and the E

whatever you was before you got to be what you are that is sometimes. For inst. suppose you use to be in the artillery and now you are a aviator you still wear a artillery uniform part of the time and its like I use to

the same color uniform on but they are all dressed up like a Roman candle you might say and if their

hemself and it will be just the news about our regt. and a few gags and comica

dy to take me for a newspaper man because I seen enough of them in baseball and one time we was playing in Phila. and I had them shut out up to the 8th inning and all of a sudden Weaver and Collins got a stroke of paralysis and tipped their caps to a couple ground balls that grazed their shoe laces and then Rube Oldring hit one on a line right at Gandil and he tried to catch it on the bounce off his lap and Bill Dinneen's right arm was lame and he begin calling everything a ball and

per looks like when it comes out and I bet it will be a fine paper if our bunch have the writein

pal,

in France

wn a part of what I wrote to give you a idear of what I wrote. He wanted I should write them up something about the stragety of baseball and where it was like the stragety in the war because one night last month I give them a little talk at one of their entertainments about how the man that used their brains in baseball was the one that win just like in the army but I guess I all ready told you about me givei

ing that is going on on the field but they's a lot of stuff that goes on on the baseball field that the gen

ago when the Boston club was playing against the Chicago White Sox where I was one of the stars when the U. S. went into the war and then I dropped baseball and signed up a contract with Uncle Sam to play for my country in the big game against the Kaiser of Germany. This day I refer to I was in there giveing them the best I had b

ner got on second base. Well they was 2 men out and Hoblitzel was the next man up and the next man after he was Scott their shortstop that couldn't take the ball in his hand and make a base hit off a man like I so instead of me giveing Hobby a ball to hit I walked him as we call i

how can he hit it and then I made Scott look like he had been sent for but couldn't come. Afterwards in the 11th. inning Duffy Lewis hit a ball that he ought to of been traded for even swinging at it b

hinker and they have got a big advantage over men that's been in other walks of life where its most all luck and I figure the army would be a whole lot better off if all the officers and gens. had of played baseball in the big leagues and learned to think quick, but of course they ain't everybody that ha

ring. The first day we was out for practice they was a young outfielder from a bush league and Mgr. Rowland told him to go out in right field and shag and this was his reply. 'I haven't never been in this park before so you will half to tel

t was great stuff and he hadn't never dreamt they was that much stragety in baseball and he thought if some of the officers seen it they would pop their eyes out and they would want to talk to me and get my idears and

ng is what wins in both of them. But I am not looking for no staff job that you don't half to go up in the trenchs and fight but just lay around in some office somewheres and stick pins in a map while the res

ing their brains if they have got them and if I can do any good with my articles i

pal,

in France

u will probably all ready of got a coppy of the paper I told you about because it come out the day before yesterday and I sent you a coppy

so I will tell you. It was from Gen. Pershing Al and it come from Paris where he is at and I have got it here laying on the table and I would send it to you to look at only I wouldn't take no chances of looseing it and I don't mean you wouldn't be carefull of it Al but of course the mail has got to go across the old pond and if the

ATE

heir task if they had enjoyed the benefits of strategic training in baseball. I have always been a great admirer of the national game of baseball and I heartily agree with what you say. But unfortunately only a few of us ever possessed t

respectfully ask whether you think some of your baseball secrets would be of strategic value to us

and if you have any suggestion to make regarding a campaign against our enemy, eithe

ame. It makes a sort of bond between us which I trust will be

y await your r

JACK P

gere, Pari

nd I haven't showed it to nobody only 3 or 4 of my buddys and I showed it to Johnny Alcock and he popped his eyes out so far you could of snipped them off with a shears. And he said it was a cinch that Pershing realy

wrote it and put some good idears in it and if my letters made a hit with Gen. Pershing the next thing you know he would probably summons me to Paris and maybe stick me on the wa

ir plans and what's comeing off and besides I would get a chance to see something of Paris and it don't look like none of us only the officers would be give leave to go there but of course I would go if Black Jack wanted me and after all Al I am here to give Uncle Sam the best I have got and if I can serve the st

e war being here in France so probably they do some of their talking in French and Alcock says if he was I he would get busy and try and learn enough French so as I could make myself understood when I had something to say and of course they probably won't nothin

I would be O. K. if I could understand it when they are talking it off but to hear

l the wile like a school teacher or something and I all most wished I hadn't never wrote that article and then of course the idear wouldn't of never came to Black Jack that I could help

pal,

in France

e other one is to Gen. Pershing and I have still got the letter her

ACK PE

Bergere, P

looking for an out and trying to hide behind a desk or something because I am afraid to go into the trenchs but I guess if you know something about baseball you won't accuse me from not having the old nerve because they can't no man hold onto a job in the big leagues unless a m

uess you want the truth. Well gen. I don't know much about running a army and their plans but stragety is the same if its on the battle field or the baseball diamond you might say and it

and of course they are Americans to but they's a whole lot of the boys that don't mean no harm but they are gabby and can't keep their mouth shut and who knows who would get a hold of it and for the same reason I don't feel like I should give you any of my idears by mail but if I could just see you and we could have a

g the situation over and see what I can think up and I all ready got some idears that I feel like they

n a poker game a pair of jacks is enough to win and maybe it will be the same way in the war game an

JACK

o hear from him back right away and I hope he will take my hint and leave me stay here with my regt. whe

t. Well we talked a wile and all of a sudden the idear come to me that I and her could hit it off and both do the other some good by her learning me French and I could learn her English and so I sprung it on her and she was tickled to death and we called it a bargain and tomorrow we are going to have our first lessons and how is that Al for a bargain when I can pick up French without it costing me a nickle and of course they won

pal,

came in and I smil

or larg

in France

and they isn't no faulse alarm about it because Capt. Seeley told us himself and said Gen. Pershing would be here in a day or 2 to overlook us and he wanted that everybody should look thei

y will be a better chance to talk things over down here then if I was to go to Paris and I am not the only one that knows why

t letter Al because I have got a lot to do to get ready and what I am going to do is write down some of my idears so as I can read them off to him when he comes and if I didn't have them wrote down I might maybe get nervous when I seen him and maybe forget

her and I didn't do it so much for what I could learn off of her but these French gals Al has had a tough time of it and if a man can bring a little sunshine into their life he wouldn't be a man unless he done it. So I was just trying to be a good fellow and here is what I get for it because I caught her today Al with that look

could tell her I am married but I don't know the French terms for it and besides it don't seem to make no difference to some of them and

rised if she cried after I come away, but what can a man do about it Al and I have got a good not

ome idears so as Black Jack won't catch me flat

pal,

in France

he bear outlines of them and when he asks me if I have got any I can just read them off from my notes like I was a lect

so gets the rabbis if you lay down bunts on him." So we would begin laying them down on him and the first thing you know he would be frothing at the mouth and triping all over himself and maybe if he did finely get a hold of the ball he would throw it into the Southren League or somewheres and before the other mgr. could get another bird warmed up they would half to hire a crossing policeman to

Johnson and before they was a man out Geo. McBride booted one and Collins and Jackson got a couple hits and we was 2 runs to the good before they was a man out. Well Johnson come back pretty good and the rest of the game the boys acted like they was scared of him and kept one foot in the water bucket but we would of win the game

o prevent a gen. from going after them with a 100 thousand men and if he can't run them ragged when you got to them 2 to I its time to enlist in the G. A. R. All though as I say a mgr. can't only use nine men at a time in baseball, but at that I know of incidents where a mgr. has took advantage of the oppts. being shy of men and one time the St. Louis club came to Chi

'clock and the other club knows when its going to begin just the same as your club so they can't ne

and he--ll if the other gen. made his preparations at night when it was dark like bringing up the troops and artilery and supplys and etc. and in that way you could take them by supprise and make them look like a fool, like in baseball I

en as long as I want to talk. But now I can't hardly wait for him to get here Al and it seems funny to think that here I am a $30 dollar a mo. doughboy and maybe in a few days I will be on the staff and they don't have nobody only officers and even a lieut.

o wear bob wire entanglements to keep Jack the Kisser away but when a man has got a wife like Florrie and here I am over here and there she is over there well Al a man don't get to sleep no quicker nights from thinking about it and I lay there night after night and wonder what and the he--ll can

and get a lieut. or something and write and tell her about it, why she would probably wait till a legal holiday to answer me back a

ife acts like that and if I give that little Ernestine a smack the n

pal,

in France

it and believe me Al if they come at us with the gas I will dive into it with my mouth wide open and see how much of it I

sure enough she was all smiles when she seen me and we talked a wile about this in that and she tried to get personal and called me cherry which is like we say dearie and finely I made the remark that I didn't think we would be here much longer and then I seen she was going to blubber so I kind of petted her hand and stroked her hair and she poked her lips out and I give her a smack Al but just like you would kiss a kid or something after they fell down and hurt themself. Well Al just as this was comeing off the door to the other part of the joint opened up and in come her

and instead of him stopping here he went out there to see us and instead of me being out there Al, here I was mixed up in a riot with an old goof over nothing you might say and Black Jack wondring where and the he--ll could I be at be

e he--ll couldn't she of wrote them a day sooner and I would of no more thought of getting excused today then fly because if I had knew how my Mrs. mist me and how much she cares I wou

pal,