David Maraniss and the book ‘When Pride Still Mattered: A Life of Vince Lombardi’

The writing of David Maraniss has offered enjoyment and knowledge to me over the years; the decision to return to a biography of football coach, husband and father Vince Lombardi proved pretty easy. First published in 1999, Maraniss‘ book When Pride Still Mattered: A Life of Vince Lombardi offers a clear and informative narrative of the man, his times, what shaped his life and the life of his family.

(Vince Lombardi played football at Fordham University in the Bronx, where he was part of the so-called ‘Seven Blocks of Granite’. Lombardi later became an assistant football coach at Fordham).

Family and his Roman Catholic faith were early influences over the work ethic and philosophy that would inform the man Vince Lombardi would become. Having grown up in Brooklyn, New York City, New York, the decision to attend Fordham University in the Bronx came rather naturally as a place to keep those ties and play football. Discipline and playing through pain and hardship were highlights of many early experiences shared in the Maraniss biography, along with the mythmaking and writing styles for how reports of college football were written of at the time. That Lombardi needed to work to break the lineup, and the feeling of contributing to a goal larger than himself, were early lessons that informed the coach Lombardi would become.

(Vince Lombardi was an assistant coach at West Point from 1949-1953).

Lombardi‘s path into coaching football was not a given, having been born in 1913 and coming of age during the Great Depression. The steps Lombardi took into coaching and teaching at Roman Catholic schools, with decisions around if and when to move into the high school ranks not always being straightforward. A degree of discipline and honoring of commitments factored into when not to move on, though the influences of his playing days and the underpinnings of those early teaching experiences where Lombardi led and developed a philosophy for how to speak to his chosen audience influenced his landing work at the West Point, a military academy of the United States based in New York state.

(David Maraniss wrote When Pride Still Mattered: A Life of Vince Lombardi, which was first published in 1999).

What Lombardi knew about football landed him work at West Point. Beyond affirming a sense of the organized development and motivation of men, Lombardi‘s time there offered an insight into dedicated documentation of film to review the tendencies of each individual player on plays. Lombardi further took a sense of how to simplify game plans down to the core points of emphasis, rather than focusing his players on understanding the full scope of the playbook. The academic cheating scandal revealed in 1951, during the time Lombardi coached at West Point, would influence the erstwhile coach later in his career despite Lombardi reportedly having no knowledge of the scheme at the point it occurred.

(From left, Vince Lombardi, his daughter Susan, his wife Marie and his son Vincent. Lombardi and Marie had married in August of 1940).

There was some degree of unease for Lombardi following his time in the college ranks, with his first advance into the NFL (National Football League) being as an assistant coach for the New York Giants from 1954 to 1958. Tom Landry would be an assistant coach for the Giants beside Lombardi, with Lombardi leaving in February 1959 to become the General Manager and head coach of the Green Bay Packers in Green Bay, Wisconsin.

(From left, Green Bay Packer quarterbacks Paul Hornung and Bart Starr were significant to the success of the Packers during Vince Lombardi‘s tenure from 1959 to 1967).

Lombardi had complicated relationships with his wife and children as he began transforming the Packers into a team that won five NFL championships, including the first two Super Bowls in his final two seasons as Packers coach. Many of the principles learned earlier in his career led to the grueling approach to coaching the team, though all who could withstand that rigor reportedly responded to Lombardi with loyalty and success. A gambling scandal in part led to the transition from Paul Hornung to Bart Starr as Packers quarterback during Lombardi‘s tenure. Both players would be elected to the Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio. Lombardi‘s career would finish with the Washington Redskins (now Washington Commanders) in Washington, DC.

(Vince Lombardi was celebrated with and by players of the Green Bay Packers at what became known as Super Bowl I in the Los Angeles Memorial Coliseum in Los Angeles, California on January 15, 1967).

The rough outlines of the life and career of Vince Lombardi are hinted at with the above details from the biography written by David Maraniss. The Maraniss thoughtfulness, thoroughness and engaging detail offer clear perspectives about the cultural place of pride for Lombardi and the football people who followed his lead. This notion applied for Lombardi and his family as well, though the relationships there were a bit more complicated, with a sense of who Vince and Marie Lombardi were to each other and their kids showing up over time, including at the time of Vince Lombardi‘s death in September 1970. I grant When Pride Still Mattered: A Life of Vince Lombardi as written by David Maraniss 4.0-stars on a scale of 1-to-5.

Matt – Monday, November 14, 2022

David Maraniss and the book ‘Path Lit by Lightning: The Life of Jim Thorpe’

Jim Thorpe was an athlete with an unparalleled sporting mythology and legacy that has been handed down through the ages. Thorpe was also a Sac and Fox Nation Native American with a personal history complicated by the prejudices of many people in government, authority and in stereotypes empowered by personal interest, arrogance and what an introduction to Path Lit by Lightning: The Life of Jim Thorpe by David Maraniss describes as “racist assimilationist philosophy” towards Native Americans.

(Jim Thorpe, shown in football gear on a football field, is the subject of the David Maraniss biography Path Lit by Lightning: The Life of Jim Thorpe).

The David Maraniss biography Path Lit by Lightning: The Life of Jim Thorpe tells a compelling story of Jim Thorpe the man, his circumstances, his influences and a respectable distance into the external influences of his life. The sharing of his athletic feats, the efforts to carve out of life that was of his choosing, and the self-serving and sometimes petty factors that conspired against him were strong factors in the tale.

(Jim Thorpe, shown in track gear, is the subject of the David Maraniss biography Path Lit by Lightning: The Life of Jim Thorpe).

The tale in earnest begins in the David Maraniss biography at the Carlisle Indian School in Carlisle, Pennsylvania as a football and track athlete coached by Pop Warner. The relationship between Warner and Thorpe is a complicated one, as was Thorpe‘s relationship with the school, the 1912 Stockholm Olympics of Stockholm, Sweden, and the first of three marriages that Thorpe had that occurred not long after those summer games. The fact that Native Americans were in many ways considered wards of the federal government of the United States through the course of Jim Thorpe‘s life presented a recurring theme that is poignantly in this biography.

(Jim Thorpe, shown in baseball gear on a baseball field, is the subject of the David Maraniss biography Path Lit by Lightning: The Life of Jim Thorpe).

The career that Jim Thorpe had as a baseball player was one that felt like it was mismanaged by people in baseball, in addition to the blurry lines between amateur and professional sports in the early twentieth century. In particular, Thorpe‘s popularity among the general public for his football and track prowess did not pair well with John McGraw of the team then known as the New York Giants (now the San Francisco Giants). The impact that this had on Thorpe’s development as a baseball player is detailed well, and in part possibly contributed to Thorpe‘s ultimate induction into the Pro Football Hall of Fame in Canton, Ohio.

(Circa 1925, Freeda Kirkpatrick, Jim Thorpe and their sons, from left, Richard, William, and Carl).

Much of Thorpe‘s life in sports, and that outside of sports, demonstrated difficulties in part due to the choices of his profession. Being in sports, and supporting causes rooted in his fame from sports, led to his being on the road for long stretches of time. This contributed to time away from his family. Fair compensation was an ongoing consideration, as were the man’s alcohol consumption, which factored into the ending of his first two marriages. The disposition of the medals Thorpe won in the 1912 Olympics proved a thread through much of the rest of Thorpe’s life, as well as his third marriage.

(David Maraniss wrote the biography Path Lit by Lightning: The Life of Jim Thorpe).

The depth of the man, along with the complexities of his life and legacy, were told in much further detail than I have raised with this introduction. The work itself spells out the humanity of Jim Thorpe, his three wives, his children, and many who shaped and were shaped by their contact with the man who has come down in mythologized fashion to me. That the David Maraniss book offers a fuller context for the man, his life and times, and many cultural and interpersonal realities that shaped the man, proves helpful. I rate Path Lit by Lightning: The Life of Jim Thorpe as written by David Maraniss 4.25-stars on a scale of 1-to-5.

Matt – Monday, September 12, 2022