The High Hard One [Paperback]

Kirby Higbe (Author), Martin Quigley (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: February 1, 1998

The High Hard One intimately portrays the rough-and-ready life of a bush-league ballplayer during the Great Depression. Kirby Higbe broke into the big time with the Chicago Cubs in 1938, showed his talent for striking out batters while pitching for the Philadelphia Phillies in 1940, and led the National League in victories for the pennant-winning Brooklyn Dodgers in 1941. He was with the Dodgers when Jackie Robinson broke the color barrier and integrated the team in 1947. That year was, for Higbe, “the end of what you might call the Babe Ruth era and the beginning of modern professional baseball.”

 

Editorial Reviews

Review

"The High Hard One is the bald confession of a hard-nosed unabashed fun-seeker who pitched, ably and often, for many teams in organized baseball. Ol' Hig's tale is told with a salty tongue, further spiced with rue and bitter memories. . . . He was . . . typical of the half-educated, strong-armed, Southern farm boys who made baseball the National Pastime."-Jim Brosnan, New York Times Book Review. (Jim Brosnan New York Tims Book Review )

"[This] is not the usual baseball autobiography. Rather, it is a bit of Americana. . . . Filled with uninhibited comment regarding both the author and other baseball notables."-Library Journal (Library Journal )

About the Author

Martin Quigley, Higbe’s coauthor, has also written the widely praised Today’s Game and The Crooked Pitch. He lives in St. Louis.

Product Details

• Paperback: 189 pages
• Publisher: Bison Books (February 1, 1998)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 080327310X
• ISBN-13: 978-0803273108
• Product Dimensions: 7.9 x 5.2 x 0.5 inches
• Shipping Weight: 7.2 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.0 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,189,491 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

8 of 9 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Hooray for this reprint, January 12, 1998

By A Customer

This review is from: The High Hard One (Paperback)

I read The High Hard One while I was in high school, and then again about 15 years ago, both times in library copies. Immediately after I read it the second time our local library purged it, and I have been looking for a copy ever since. This biography of Higbe stands out from all of the saccharine self-righteous hackneyed sports biographies to which we have been exposed. Higbe tells what it was like to be a working man and a baseball player. Higbe does not claim to have been a role model or a hero. He describes his life as he went from poverty to major league baseball to prison, and his skills, his gifts, and his personality flaws are all on display. He was not a nice man, but his life story sheds accurate light on the prejudices and beliefs of the people that fans turn into heroes. His willingness to look honestly at his life, even though that look was not complimentary, shows admirable courage.

4 of 6 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars It's all relative, April 12, 2002

By 

Mary Higbe (Dallas) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The High Hard One (Paperback)

It's interesting to read other people's reviews of this book. Kirby Higbe was my great uncle. I never met him- in fact, he was always referred to as crazy... but that just goes with being a Higbe, I think. I asked my dad for a copy of this book when I was younger, and he told me it would be impossible to find. Chances are, he just didn't want me to see any of the skeletons in the closet. It's odd seeing Uncle Kirby's face and seeing my dad, and uncle, and grandfather's features there. I think the book had a different meaning for me than it would for other readers. It was more a search for family history rather than learning more about baseball.

2 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

3.0 out of 5 stars Brutally Honest, February 23, 2002

By 

W. Wayne Marlow (Schofield Barracks, Hi United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: The High Hard One (Paperback)

You've got to hand it to a man who admits if he could do it all over again, he would still oppose Jackie Robinson breaking the color barrier. And who uses his autobiography to mention he sold prescription drugs to inmates when he was a guard.
As offensive as his stances and actions are, you know you're not getting any pretenses with this guy. Higbe had only a seventh-grade education, so he had plenty of help from Martin Quigley in sounding eloquent, and Quigley does a good job there.
This isn' t a groundbreaking work, but it is a quick, enjoyable read.