Sports Fact & Book Rec of the Day 1/23-24/2012

1/23/1944:
The New York Rangers suffer a 15-0 drubbing at the hands of the Red Wings at the Olympia Stadium in the most one-sided game in NHL history. Detroit scores two goals int he first period, five int he second, and eight in the third. The shutout is recorded by rookie goaltender Connie Dion, playing in only his fifth NHL game following his discharge from the Canadian Army. Ken McAuley gives up all 15 Detroit goals to 10 different players. The hapless Rangers possessed a 6-39-5 record during the 1943-44 season. Beginning with tonight's debacle, the New York club will be winless over their last 21 games with 17 defeats and 4 ties. They'll start next season with four losses in a row, extending their winless streak to 25, before beating the Red Wings, 5-2, on November 9 at Madison Square Garden.

Birthdays:
Jerry Kramer b. 1936
Petr Korda b. 1968
Eric Metcalf b. 1968
Alan Embree b. 1970
Julie Foudy b. 1971

1/24/1952:
The NFL awards a franchise to a group from Dallas headed by Texas millionaire Giles Miller. Five days earlier, the league was reduced from 12 teams to 11 when Ted Collins sold the New York Yanks franchise back to the league. After an 0-7 start to the 1952 seasons and dwindling attendance figures at the Cotton Bowl, Miller will give the Texans back to the NFL. For the last five games, the commissioner's office operates the club as a road team based in Hershey, Pennsylvania. Two "home" games are played in Akron, Ohio, one of which results in the lone win of the 12-game season, a 27-23 decision over the Chicago Bears on Thanksgiving Day before a crowd of only 3,000. At the end of the season, the Texans move to Baltimore and are renamed the Colts. In 1960, the NFL awards an expansion team to Dallas. This one is named the Cowboys and becomes one of the most successful franchises in pro football history.

Birthdays:
Giorgio Chiuaglia b. 1947
Atlee Hammaker b. 1958
Rob Dibble b. 1964
Mary Lou Retton b. 1968
Scott Kazmire b. 1984

ENDURING CLASSIC

Why read Edith Wharton? According to the critic Margaret Drabble, “Wharton depicted women caught between constraint and the possibilities of a new sexual freedom—a freedom that she herself enjoyed, though at high cost. Female rivalry and jealousy … are well caught in the celebrated ‘Roman Fever.’” That’s a mouthful, but “Roman Fever” is a riveting, seductive, and fierce tale of women and their secrets with a wicked twist at the end. As painfully beautiful as House of Mirth, in many fewer pages!
    Also worthy of note: A Wharton gem is back in print in Twilight Sleep, her little-known novel of the Jazz Age.

ROMAN FEVER AND OTHER STORIES, by Edith Wharton (1911; Scribner, 1997)

EX LIBRIS

What Anthony Bourdain does for restaurants, what Atul Gawande does for hospitals, Marilyn Johnson does for libraries. In a “heroic” (O, the Oprah Magazine) and “marvelous” (Christopher Buckley) state-of-the-union report, Johnson takes us on a behind-the-scenes tour and reminds us, with vivid details, of libraries’ importance to education, culture, history, and community.

THIS BOOK IS OVERDUE! HOW LIBRARIANS AND CYBRARIANS CAN SAVE US ALL, by Marilyn Johnson (Harper Perennial, 2011)