| Contents |
List of illustrations -- Acknowledgments -- List of abbreviations -- Prologue -- The making of a baseball brain, 1899-1918 -- Diamond in the rough -- From catcher to coach -- Branch Rickey and the St. Louis Browns -- "War overshadows everything" -- The St. Louis prime of Branch Rickey, 1919-1942 -- Necessity is the mother of invention -- Years of contention and frustration -- That championship season -- The near-dynastic years and a place in who's who -- Another championship season and then decline -- Prelude to the Gashouse Gang -- The triumph of the Gashouse Gang -- Years of frustration -- More years of loss, and farewells to Dizzy Dean and Charley Barrett -- Going out on top -- The birth of the Mahatma, 1943-1950 -- A branch grows in Brooklyn -- The secret path to the "young man from the West" -- An historic meeting in Brooklyn -- Prelude to a pennant -- When all hell almost broke loose -- When most of Heaven rejoiced -- A year of disappointment, odd choices, and an adieu to Leo -- A branch bends in Brooklyn -- A branch is chopped in Brooklyn -- "My greatest thrill in baseball hasn't happened yet," 1951-1965 -- A branch doesn't grow fast enough in Pittsburgh -- Mr. Rickey prepares to do the continental -- The continental dance card goes blank -- Meet me in St. Louis, final chorus -- Notes -- Bibliography -- Index. |
