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Connie Mack #3
The Grand Old Man of Baseball: Connie Mack in His Final Years, 1932-1956
In The Grand Old Man of Baseball , Norman L. Macht chronicles Connie Mack’s tumultuous final two decades in baseball. After Mack had built one of baseball’s greatest teams, the 1929–31 Philadelphia Athletics, the Depression that followed the stock market crash fundamentally reshaped Mack’s legacy as his team struggled on the field and at the gate. Among the challenges Mack a sharp drop in attendance that forced him to sell his star players; the rise of the farm system, which he was slow to adopt; the opposition of other owners to night games, which he favored; the postwar integration of baseball, which he initially opposed; a split between the team’s heirs (Mack’s sons Roy and Earle on one side, their half brother Connie Jr. on the other) that tore apart the family and forced Mack to choose—unwisely—between them; and, finally, the disastrous 1951–54 seasons in which Roy and Earle ran the club to the brink of bankruptcy.
By now aged and mentally infirm, Mack watched in bewilderment as the business he had built fell apart. Broke and in debt, Roy and Earle feuded over the sale of the team. In a never-before-revealed series of maneuvers, Roy double-crossed his father and brother and the team was sold and moved to Kansas City in 1954. In Macht’s third volume of his trilogy on Mack, he describes the physical, mental, and financial decline of Mack’s final years, which unfortunately became a classic American tragedy.
By now aged and mentally infirm, Mack watched in bewilderment as the business he had built fell apart. Broke and in debt, Roy and Earle feuded over the sale of the team. In a never-before-revealed series of maneuvers, Roy double-crossed his father and brother and the team was sold and moved to Kansas City in 1954. In Macht’s third volume of his trilogy on Mack, he describes the physical, mental, and financial decline of Mack’s final years, which unfortunately became a classic American tragedy.
672 pages, Hardcover
First published October 1, 2015
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61 people want to read
About the author
Norman L. Macht
53 books4 followersNorman Macht is a freelance baseball historian who has authored numerous books and innumerable articles in publications such as Baseball Digest, The Sporting News, National Sports Daily, Sports Heritage, USA Today Baseball Weekly, The San Francisco Examiner and The National Pastime (plus other SABR publications).
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Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews
October 25, 2025
Caps a masterwork of baseball scholarship. I’ve made this comment in reviews of the previous volumes, but Macht covers decades of baseball history through the lens of one manager/team. Even though this isn’t the most exciting time in A’s history, Macht brings in the color of baseball’s regular rhythm, covering ~20 years. I have similar slight gripes with this volume too, as I think Macht forgives Mack some missteps and biases that he should be taken to task for - namely, his resistance to integrating baseball. When Macht is so insightful on other matters, it’s pretty frustrating when he’s just like, “well, racism was normal back then,” to excuse the A’s for upholding the color line.
November 27, 2020
I must confess that I approached this book with more than my usual amount of curiosity. Connie Mack was certainly an important figure in the history of baseball — but a three-volume biography of his life? Did his life justify such attention? And why does it take three volumes to tell the story of it?
It turns out that the answer to the last question is pretty straightforward, as Macht writes not just an account of Mack's like and times, but a season-by-season chronicle of the Philadelphia A's. It's an understandable decision, given the importance of the team to Mack's life — he was both majority owner and manager of the club. And to Macht's credit, he never loses sight of the fact that his book is a biography of Mack and not a history of the team. But it does result in the book that one has to be a baseball fan to enjoy, which may be obvious given the subject but is nonetheless true to provide the perseverance necessary to wade through the details.
Macht's tale is a sad one of the decline and departure of a storied baseball club. The story picks up at the start of 1932, with the A's recovering from a close loss in the World Series to the St. Louis Cardinals. Though Macht regards the team as possibly the best in the history of baseball, Mack was soon forced to sell some of his top players due to the increasing financial strictures imposed by the Great Depression. With attendance declining dramatically, Mack had to cut costs and the only way he could was by reducing his payroll.
Despite his cutbacks, Mack still pined for another pennant, and he scoured the country looking for good players. Yet Macht notes that for all of Mack's knowledge about the game, he missed out of the future: the farm system. Slow to adopt it himself, Mack's teams had to struggle uphill against organizations with well-groomed players ready for the big leagues. Though Mack made halfhearted gestures to create a farm system by the end of the 1930s, throughout most of the decade his teams fought simply to post winning records. While baseball recovered by the end of the decade, America's entry into World War II forced another four years of hobbled play. It was only after the war that the octogenarian Mack finally had his last opportunity to win a pennant, only to fall short in 1948.
Macht recounts all of this is a book heavily seasoned with anecdotes. They make for lively reading, conveying a time when professional baseball was a lot more haphazard and fun than it seems today. They also make this a book primarily written for baseball fans, something further underscored by Mack's frequent use of baseball slang, which is employed without explanation. It's a trivial barrier, though, for anyone who is interested in learning about the fascinating life of a baseball legend, one whose life spanned the establishment of "America's pastime."
It turns out that the answer to the last question is pretty straightforward, as Macht writes not just an account of Mack's like and times, but a season-by-season chronicle of the Philadelphia A's. It's an understandable decision, given the importance of the team to Mack's life — he was both majority owner and manager of the club. And to Macht's credit, he never loses sight of the fact that his book is a biography of Mack and not a history of the team. But it does result in the book that one has to be a baseball fan to enjoy, which may be obvious given the subject but is nonetheless true to provide the perseverance necessary to wade through the details.
Macht's tale is a sad one of the decline and departure of a storied baseball club. The story picks up at the start of 1932, with the A's recovering from a close loss in the World Series to the St. Louis Cardinals. Though Macht regards the team as possibly the best in the history of baseball, Mack was soon forced to sell some of his top players due to the increasing financial strictures imposed by the Great Depression. With attendance declining dramatically, Mack had to cut costs and the only way he could was by reducing his payroll.
Despite his cutbacks, Mack still pined for another pennant, and he scoured the country looking for good players. Yet Macht notes that for all of Mack's knowledge about the game, he missed out of the future: the farm system. Slow to adopt it himself, Mack's teams had to struggle uphill against organizations with well-groomed players ready for the big leagues. Though Mack made halfhearted gestures to create a farm system by the end of the 1930s, throughout most of the decade his teams fought simply to post winning records. While baseball recovered by the end of the decade, America's entry into World War II forced another four years of hobbled play. It was only after the war that the octogenarian Mack finally had his last opportunity to win a pennant, only to fall short in 1948.
Macht recounts all of this is a book heavily seasoned with anecdotes. They make for lively reading, conveying a time when professional baseball was a lot more haphazard and fun than it seems today. They also make this a book primarily written for baseball fans, something further underscored by Mack's frequent use of baseball slang, which is employed without explanation. It's a trivial barrier, though, for anyone who is interested in learning about the fascinating life of a baseball legend, one whose life spanned the establishment of "America's pastime."
September 17, 2024
This was a great series on the life of Connie Mack.
However, each book in the series was a bit lesser than the previous book.
You learn a lot about the sad family machinations that led to the demise of the Philadelphia Athletics: An old man set on old ways, leaving the family business to the oldest son, when the youngest was the one with the most business sense and charisma.
There is a lot of filler in this book - a column written by Ed Sullivan about the Athletics spending spring training in southern California takes up more than two pages and tells you nothing of note, as does a transcript of an American League meeting that ate up more than eight pages.
The writing of the third bool in the series is at times trite, which was not the case in the first two entries and riddled with factual errors big and small.
However, each book in the series was a bit lesser than the previous book.
You learn a lot about the sad family machinations that led to the demise of the Philadelphia Athletics: An old man set on old ways, leaving the family business to the oldest son, when the youngest was the one with the most business sense and charisma.
There is a lot of filler in this book - a column written by Ed Sullivan about the Athletics spending spring training in southern California takes up more than two pages and tells you nothing of note, as does a transcript of an American League meeting that ate up more than eight pages.
The writing of the third bool in the series is at times trite, which was not the case in the first two entries and riddled with factual errors big and small.
April 29, 2019
Well, it took me four years to read this book, and over ten years to read all three of the tomes in Macht's truly brilliant biographical series on Connie Mack. And I have to say that these three books are the stuff of legend, just like Mr. Mack was. In this, the last book in the series, Macht continues to show his incredible research abilities, and his easy to read writing style, perfectly suited to describing anything to do with baseball. An EASY 5-star read, without a doubt.
September 18, 2019
The amount of work put into this three-volume series is truly impressive and I learned many nuances of baseball long ago as well as a tremendous amount about the demographic and geographic changes of 20th century Philadelphia. However, I did not get a clear sense of Connie Mack, the man, and what made his great teams so great. And that was why I read all 2,000 pages of this series.
November 27, 2022
The conclusion to a long three volumes on Mack that are thoroughly worth the read. Really a history of the first century of professional baseball through the eyes of one of the key characters.
March 10, 2025
Well-written, fair and often sympathetic bio of one of baseball's icon's last years.
February 18, 2016
The final installment in Macht's Mack bio was very good. The battle in 1954 over the A's was so depressing to read (or should I say dysfunctional). Macht's account takes you in the backrooms to see some of the ongoing's and different sides to the battle. A few times, Macht editorialized where not necessary, but overall, I recommend this book.
April 7, 2021
Fabulous biography
This third volume of the set is a fitting conclusion to one of baseball’s great figures. The book details his concluding years in rich detail . Any baseball fan would be neglectful if he doesn’t read this amazing person’s life .
This third volume of the set is a fitting conclusion to one of baseball’s great figures. The book details his concluding years in rich detail . Any baseball fan would be neglectful if he doesn’t read this amazing person’s life .
March 8, 2017
Excellent book on the final years of Connie Mack. Really surprised by his celebrity status. Sad the way it ended with the team moving to Kansas City. Could have been avoided.
Read
April 9, 2016Great book on a real gentleman.
Displaying 1 - 11 of 11 reviews