Double Legacy Of The Iron Horse

Gehrig died at home on June 2, 1941, 16 years to the day after he replaced Pipp in the Yankee lineup. A few years after his death his wife appeared before a U.S. Senate subcommittee to plead for funds for research. In her testimony she summed up what had happened to her husband. "At first," she said, "he simply couldn't play baseball with the skill which won him a place in the Hall of Fame. Then he couldn't play well enough to stay in the Yankee lineup. Finally, he couldn't play baseball at all. As the disease progressed, he couldn't dress himself, he couldn't feed himself, he couldn't walk."

The obituaries and editiorials on Gehrig filled the nation's newspapers, and for the next two years he was honored in various ways, most often by having something named after him. Signs bearing the words LOU GEHRIG FIELD went up on previously nameless baseball diamonds in towns and on military bases around the country. In addition, the Yankees retired his number (the first time that it was done in baseball) and erected a monument to him in centerfield.

The disease took his name as well. Amyotrophic lateral sclerosis stripped Gehrig of his magnificent skill as a baseball player, killed him and got itself a new name in the process. And because the term Lou Gehrig's disease is so common now, it's easy to overlook just how odd that is. How ironic. Most diseases either have technical names, like poliomyelitis; names related to symptoms, like scarlet fever; or they are named for the man or men who first identified them, like Alzheimer's or Parkinson's. Gehrig is the only individual patient to have a disease named after him. Although it began as a reflection of Gehrig's fame, the name shift also testifies to the eerie power of ALS to consume its victims. When it consumed Gehrig, it also consumed his career. As a result, one of the greatest baseball players who ever lived is best known for the way he died.

Lou Gehrig didn't just get ALS, he became ALS. And while his case is exceptional, it's a good example of the multifaceted nature of serious disease. A disease is many things. It is a group of related symptoms. It is also the underlying organic disorder that causes the symptoms. A disease is a foreign thing, an invading foe to be battled. It is also a natural process arising in the patient's body, a part of that body. ALS was the death of Gehrig, and it was a terrible death. But it was also part of his life, and that was a positive life even as it came to an end. In the face of this disease Gehrig displayed dignity and optimism, a dignity and optimism perhaps best exemplified by the eloquent speech he made at Yankee Stadium on Lou Gehrig Day, July 4, 1939, when he said he considered himself "the luckiest man on the face of the earth."

Another kind of eloquence best ends the story of Lou Gehrig and his disease. It is found in a headline that ran on the back page of the New York Daily News the day after Gehrig was honored at Yankee Stadium. It reads: YANKS SPLIT, LOU WEEPS WHILE 61,808 FANS CHEER. That does it. It captures the ironic tragedy of it all with just the right mix of baseball and reality, business as usual and business not so usual at all, with a stat, of course, to hold it all together. The Yanks win one and the Yanks lose one and Lou is gone and the game goes on.

The great thing about baseball is the way it never ends; there is always another inning, another game, another season. And Gehrig, better than anyone, understood the beauty of that idea, and the power of it. Nothing strange, nothing mysterious, just keep playing and try to win more than you lose. The only real mystery of Lou Gehrig's life was the mystery of his death. Everything else was as clear and as simple as a line drive on a sunny day.