In the closing stages of Richard Ben Cramer's biography of Joe DiMaggio there is an exchange between the baseball legend and a man called Cappy Harada for whom DiMaggio had done a bit of business. The episode is undated in the book, but took place some time before the San Francisco earthquake of 1989, at which time DiMaggio was 74. Cappy showed up at the bank that Joe used as a personal office and where he spent a lot of his time. He had bought Joe a brand new Cadillac and now dropped the keys into Joe's hand.

LRB 10 May 2001 | PDF Download