Coffey: Clyde Sukeforth: The man who scouted Jackie Robinson and Roberto Clemente
From Alex Coffey at The Athletic on April 15, 2020:
Just off State Highway 220 in the tiny coastal town of Waldoboro, Maine, a rutted, dirt road cuts through the countryside and takes you past a rectangular white sign: “Brookland Cemetery, Closed Dark ’til Dawn.” Ancient oak trees are the keepers of these graves. If you’re driving too fast, and even if you’re not, you might miss it. I’ve missed it. You have to find Brookland Cemetery. It doesn’t find you.
Three miles up the road from Brookland is Moody’s Diner, a local landmark and time-honored stopping point for vacationers. ME-220 connects with ME-32 S, which, if you take it 24.7 miles down, will give way to Pemaquid Point Lighthouse. You’ll know you’re getting close when you see an endless vista of the Atlantic Ocean, bounded by pine trees that hug the coast. When the smell of saltwater fills your nose, and the sound of waves crashing like cymbals fills your ears.
My family has been making the pilgrimage to Round Pond, Maine, for a quarter-century. Surely there are other places, places that have a population of more than 582 people and are less than a seven-hour drive away from New York, where you can see these sights and smell these smells and hear these sounds. But you don’t just see or smell or hear in Maine. You feel. You connect. And in doing so, you disconnect from busy-ness, and traffic and so much outside noise.
Read the full article here (subscription required): https://theathletic.com/1746905/2020/04/15/clyde-sukeforth-the-man-who-scouted-jackie-robinson-and-roberto-clemente/
Originally published: April 16, 2020. Last Updated: April 16, 2020.