Rothenberg: The Babe, a chicken, and a record for both
From SABR member Matt Rothenberg at BaseballHall.org on July 6, 2017:
Babe Ruth was many things to many people: A hero to children and a superstar to baseball fans. However, the one thing he was not was a chicken.
Or was he? As the United States celebrates National Fried Chicken Day on July 6, we take a look back at the intersection of The Bambino and his poultry counterpart.
Newspaper headlines such as “Babe Ruth Seeks Record for Eggs,” or “Babe Ruth Slow on 168th Laying,” might give the average reader pause. In 1927, though, there was more than one Babe Ruth in the news, and the feathered one was receiving just as much attention as the home run-hitting one.
By Sept. 24, the human Babe Ruth – a Baltimore-born slugger for the Yankees – was knocking one round tripper after another, chasing his record of 59 home runs, set in 1921. The avian Babe Ruth was a white leghorn hen known as “Lady Amco of Norfolk,” as she hailed from the Norfolk, Neb., chicken farm of A.R. Landers. But she might have been more Lou Gehrig than Babe Ruth.
Read the full article here: http://baseballhall.org/discover/the-babe-a-chicken-and-a-record-for-both
Originally published: July 6, 2017. Last Updated: July 6, 2017.