So Im flipping through the channels looking for some soft-core porn, um I mean political investigative reporting news programs and I come across 'JimThorpe, All American' starring Chuck Heston(correction: starring Burt Lancaster, courtesy of jimshitz) on the YES Network. Yes that YES Network, so being the faithful Mets fan that I am I kept on flipping, but it did get me thinking.
This may come as a bit of a shock to those that look at me as some backwards hilljack cracker, but growing up where I did, Ive always had an incredible amount of respect and admiration for the Indian culture. Now before you get in a tizzy, thats right I said it..Indian, not Native-American, sorry folks dont believe in hyphenated peoples. So as I was saying, I grew up surrounded by the many tribes of the Iroquois Nation. I learned about their rich history, and played their game, the fastest game on two feet, lacrosse.
But back to Thorpe, Im not one of those guys that will sit around and babble about the golden era of sports, and how athletes back yonder were real men and the kids nowadays are nothing but spoiled punks. For one thing I aint old enough, the sports and the athletes of this era are my era, and secondly I disagree. Athletes are bigger, stronger, and faster now but no more pampered today than the the ancient Greek Olympians. Athletes have always been put on pedestals and treated better than the average butcher, baker and candlestick maker. The checks are just bigger now.
Jim Thorpe was the real deal. As King Gustov declared "Sir you are the greatest athlete in the world". Thorpe was legit. He was a gold medal winning Olympic track star, professional baseball player, All Star professional football player, and astronaut (got ya) Yeah thats right, before Bo, before Deion. The guy had eight kids from 3 different wifes (always the benchmark of a great athlete, see: Garvey,Steve) Two fast facts courtesy of JimThorpe.com
Believe it or not, Thorpe once hit 3 home runs into 3 different states in the same game. During a semi-pro baseball game in a ballpark on the Texas-Oklahoma-Arkansas border, he hit his first homer over the leftfield wall with the ball landing in Oklahoma, his second homer over the rightfield wall into Arkansas and his third homer of the game was an inside-the-park home run in centerfield, which was in Texas!
Thorpe is one of two men in history who played
for the New York Giants in two different sports. In football, he was the New York Giants running back and in baseball he was the New York Giants outfielder.
I only know Jim Thorpe from second hand sources, but it brings me back to an Iroquois Creation myth I learned as a young scout. The Creator after witnessing the majesty of the earth that he had just created, and the wonderful animals inhabiting it, decided it was missing just one thing, man. He went about building a clay oven, to make man. The first man came out undercooked, the white man, but the Creator wasnt entirely satisfied. The second was overcooked, the black man, but the Creator wasnt entirely satisfied. The third came out a golden brown, and the Creator was pleased. Well, with Jim Thorpe he hit the nail on the head.
25 comments:
Jim Thorpe was an amazing man (I think the show that you flipped by was on Yes's play on dinner & a movie called Yogi & a Movie; seriously there is such a thing). Anyway, he was also a bitter man. He had his Olympic medals taken from him because he played semi pro baseball during a college break over the summer. He wasn't even paid to play...He was given money for meals and a room on the road but that was it...It was a shame because the stigma kept him out of the coaching ranks in his later years but he really did nothing wrong at least in my estimation. Thorpe turned to firewater to ease the pain and the rest is sort of tragic. I don't look down on him for this because he was really given a raw deal. Just like Pete Rose (who belongs in the Hall even though he was an is an ass****), you cannot take away the fact that Thorpe was the most incredibly dominant athlete of his time.
well i hope we don't get into trouble now because of your half baked (pun intended) comments on intelligent design. You know that's not the accepted theory. I mean you can't prove intelligent design, that's why we can only teach evolution....... which is also unproven.... hey i forget, why do we only teach the atheist theory again?
Because the Adam & Eve theory is even more preposterous that Darwin monkey man theory. According to the Bible, Adam and Eve had two sons. So either we evolved from some animal that Cain & Abel had sex with or we are all the product of incest...plus the latter things that happened in the Bible to further the human race as well as the animal kingdom are also sort of preposterous. I mean, if there was a flood the kind that would destroy humanity and everything in it (land mass included) but a manmade arc, wouldn't there be some evidence of said flood? Well, if it's true I am going to hell but I just don't buy it...but, since we are ringing in the New Year in the Two Dizzizzle Nikel & a Bit, I will say that I am glad Noah grabbed a Rhino & an Ass to come along for the journey of re-creation and recreation.
The Bible isnt in my top 10, but having read it a few times (Cliff Notes version) I think its safe to say thats its not meant to taken literally. Reminds me off a time discussing the Bible with a cousin's boyfriend from Derry, and when told that Jonah wasnt actually swallowed by a whale his head almost exploded, I swear if his priest was in front of him, he would have strangled him for the lies and decption. The fact remains that the theory of evolution is no closer to being proven scientifically than the theory of creativism. Both are studies in faith. Im gonna side with eternal salvation on this one, until conclusively proven otherwise. Although I do love the Kinks song "Apeman"
A lot of people take the Bible as it is...In fact Roman Catholics are literally supposed to...but I agree with you that it should be taken as is all the time. In truth I don't think St.Pete is going to turn me away, if I beleived in Jesus, was truly sorry for my sins and did my best to help others, just because I didn't beleive Adam formed Eve out of his spare rib...If it is true that she was indeed brought to be out of this Janet Jacksian removal of a rib, do you think when she was just a bit of clay she sang," Give me your baby back baby back...baby back ribs"?
fly, i am not a biblical scholar, i don't even go to church, but intelligent design actually seems more reasonable to me. think about it, we can't find one "missing link" species for any animal anywhere in the world! not one! how could that be? i'm sure archeologists must be searching for one, they would be the biggest thing in thier industry ever!! yet they can't find anything at all? must be because they don't exist.
I agree Wand3K about the Red Man, but what about Method Man. Blackout was off the chains.
Suckers break like Turbo and Ozone
did you say red man?
but opposite spectrum, this done by red man
with horns on his head, laid down the ill plan
Got all his helpers, said, "Make it snappy!
Tell all the people that their hair can't be nappy!"
hey wife, by the way, you say:
"all mankind is too egotistical to believe that there is a greater power out there which is responsible for life."
this is obviously not right. in fact most of the world outside of the upper east side actually does believe that a greater power does exist and is responsible for life.
I agree with you on this Rhino, sort of...I think scientist are looking for missing links or anomaly's that could support evolution...the only problem is, they don't have the technology or the resources to look where it probably is. More than half the world is covered by water. Ocean's with depths that are inconceivably unreachable, and so no one man or machine has ever been able to come close to handling the pressure that such an abyss can create. It isn't dreamt by scientists (and I am only basing this on the Discovery channel & National Geographic mags that I read in doctor's offices)that such strange creatures exist...It is beleived to be fact that unseen & unexplained creatures swim in the deepest darkest portions of our seas. But at this point I will go back to agreeing with you in that the world above us is also so strange and unique that whatever brough about humanity, the birds, the bee's and all the air we breathed and breathe; that God & not the Devil or Darwin was in the details...somewhere. I don't want to take anything away from the Devil mind you. I have heard that once upon a time when he was G-O-D's right hand man...a long long time ago, that he helped create the trees and especially those fuzzy little green budly one's that the kids are so fond of...To me, even if they found Loch Nessie or some even more bizarre prehistoric creature, this would only go to the point of proving God's existence more. I don't beleive in the Bible's version of evolution but I do beleive in God's certain involvement. If there was a big bang for instance, God clapped His hands, snapped His fingers, winked His eye, whatever happened, He made it happen. He made the earth and He made you and me.
As for the proud and tragic Redman let me borrow from John "don't fly drunk; don't, don't, don't, etc." Denver when I say:
I was a Redman. I was proud I was strong. You were the white man and you stole away my home. Now I am a wooden Indian standing silent in the rain. I swear by my granfather's father that we're gonna rise again...I was Redman and my passing made no sound. You were a white man and you tore apart the ground. Now I am a wooden Indian standing silent in the rain. And I swear by my granfather's father that we're gonna rise again."
I just want to say one more thing about Oceanography that always makes me mad. We haven't even begun to understand the world that we live in and yet we persue space like adventurers with our heads cut off...I wonder, if we put half the money we have put into NASA (NASA is a good thing, I'm not ripping NASA) over the years, would we have discovered what lies beneath and possibly have made the world we actually live in a better place. Would this actually be a better idea than looking for a suitable replacement when we are done destroying this Earth we live on presently? just a thought...
Also as Johnny D would say "Oh God" (Part 1)
He was a non beleiver until George Burns fucked up his shit...I mean he was married to Terri Garr when she was hot and not making Lite FM commercials...Oh God Part II had a song that I loved when I was a kid...Want to hear it? Here it goes. Sort of I think...
"I got the horse right here. His name is Paul Revere and if you ask the horse if the weather is clear. He can do. He can do. The horse says the Man can do."
It's a teeny tiny reference to my main Man - JC who wasn't born yesterday...He was born last week! And there isn't anything He can't do...like Him and his Pops creating the world.
Isn't funny how a discussion about evolution was born from a topic of Jim Thorpe and his legacy. Like I said, it is God not the devil in the details. Pretty crazy but this is the kind of stuff that I think is unexplainable...not Twilight Zone kind of unexplainable but just weird...Who is driving the bus in our mind? Built with a Free Will transmission but again, Who drives the bus?
Mrs Bettis?
As any Maiden fan knows, they didnt take buses. They ran...
White man came across the sea
He brought us pain and misery
He killed our tribes, he killed our creed
He took our game for his own need
We fought him hard we fought him well
Out on the plains we gave him hell
But many came too much for cree
Oh will we ever be set free?
Riding through dustclouds and barren wastes
Galloping hard on the plains
Chasing the redskins back to their holes
Fighting them at their own game
Murder for freedom a stab in the back
Women and children and cowards attack
Run to the hills run for your lives
Run to the hills run for your lives
yeah fly i hear ya about the oceans, but doesn't the theory go something like, we crawled from the muck? or whatever? didn't we come from the oceans and then walk on land? well of all the billions or zillions of different species of animal, or insect, or whatever on this planet we haven't found 1 transitional species? Not 1 missing link? we've found dinosaurs from millions of years ago, we've found evidence of prehistoric cavemen, but we can't find 1 missing link? if evolution was true, we would have found something, anything, a clue, something that would create doubt. there is no proof at all, none, zip, nada, zilch. Just one mans theory that society decided to believe made sense. But don't forget, for hundreds of years we thought the sun rotated around the earth, and we thought black men couldn't play quarterback at the nfl level. both theories disproven by the same man by the way, all hail Doug Williams.
I'm more of a Doug Flutie type...being a small white guy. Remember, natural selection favors the smaller of the species. The larger animals die out and us cockroaches crawl out a little worse for the wear but alive.
God is driving the bus...I thought you would realize my intent when I capitalized the "W" in Who...Happy New Year dudes...I am planning my escape from work as we speak...Wish me luck!
good luck fly, happy new year.
Just to point out something (not that any of you care, because it's pretty obvious that you you probably won't), but yes, there had to be incest there in the beginning.
Let's forget Adam and Eve - let's say there was Darrin and Barbara. There still had to be incest, duh.
You seem to make it out to be God's fault there is incest. It just had to happen, no matter who the couple and the kids were.
And Pete Rose does not belong in the hall of fame - my gosh, can you say "singles' hitter" in the era of the home run?
Yeah okay 4200 hits. I could ring up 4200 hits if I played from 1963-1987 too.
By the way, the Jim Thorpe, All American movie I know of doesn't even have Charlton Heston in it. It stars Burt Lancaster and it's a fine film.
Is there another film out we don't know about? ;)
I stand corrected
I was re-reading my comments...I kind of came off like an ass - sorry about that guys.
I take offense to your implication that being an ass would constitute something negative.
Seriously though, is this your frist visit to The Aurora?
We would be offended if you were NOT an ass.
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