Victory Faust: The Rube Who Saved McGraw's Giants [Paperback]

Gabriel Schechter (Author)

Book Description

Publication Date: April 14, 2000 | ISBN-10: 0965442489 | ISBN-13: 978-0967522104

This book of historical nonfiction chronicles the bizarre adventures of Victory Faust and the 1911 New York Giants. Despite a lack of baseball skills, Faust joined the Giants, became their good-luck mascot, helped them win the pennant, and got his reward by pitching in two games. The book details the trials of John McGraw's vintage Giants that made them so susceptible to the positive influence of Faust, a Kansas farmer so determined to pitch the Giants to the pennant that nothing could stop him.

Editorial Reviews

From Booklist

Advised of his destiny by a fortune teller, Charley Faust was convinced that he would lead the 1911 New York Giants to victory. Schechter labors mightily to sort long-ago facts from the myths spun by New York's hyperbolic baseball press. Quoting contemporary accounts and reprinting vintage illustrations, he transports readers to the baseball world of 1911. John McGraw ruled the Giants, and the Giants ruled New York, even without a home field for much of the year. Although Faust was nominally a pitcher, his main role was to jinx the opposition, and he wasn't the only major league mascot-jinx. Connie Mack kept a hunchbacked dwarf on the Philadelphia A's bench, but no other mascot succeeded like Faust. It seemed that with him at hand, the Giants couldn't lose, and when he wasn't, they couldn't win. A fascinating, book-length look at one of baseball's charming oddities--the very stuff of the game and its literature. Mike Tribby
Copyright © American Library Association. All rights reserved

About the Author

Gabriel Schechter was born in Glen Cove, New York and was raised in New Jersey. His father had attended the 1919 World Series in Cincinnati; his mother was from Brooklyn, and the couple lived in Coogan's Bluff above the Polo Grounds only a few years before their son was born. So his lifelong obsession with baseball is congenital.

After graduating from Colgate University, Schechter earned an M.A. in English from the University of Oregon. He taught for three years at the University of Montana in Missoula. There he rediscovered the story of Charles "Victory" Faust and began a two-decade-long search for the best way to tell Faust's unique story. What began as a novel modernizing the Faust story and letting him help the Cubs win the World Series, has metamorphosed over the years into VICTORY FAUST: The Rube Who Saved McGraw's Giants, the nonfiction "true story" of baseball's most bizarre character.

In 1980, Schechter moved to Las Vegas, where he spent the 80s writing about the gaming industry. He published dozens of Runyonesque short stories, articles and columns about poker language and psychology, and sports pieces. He dealt five years at the World Series of Poker and covered it several other years as a reporter, providing a dealer's-eye view of the world's most famous gamblers. A collection of his Las Vegas writings is planned.

In 1991 he moved to Cooperstown, New York, renewing the Faust quest. There he set a record at the National Baseball Library for the longest continuous research visit, one full year. This time the novel was going to involve a World Series title for the Red Sox. Alas, it dawned on him that there must be more real information on Faust than the two pages of meager clippings in his library file. Three weeks of digging into old newspapers on microfilm later, he had several hundred clippings about Faust, the backbone of this book. Realizing that the true story was far more vivid and powerful than the novel he was trying to invent, he continued his research, putting the pieces of the Faust puzzle together.

This book, his first, was honored as a finalist for the recently announced SABR Seymour Medal, awarded to the best book of baseball history published in the past year. The book has been optioned by Disney, which is developing a major motion picture about Victory Faust. Schechter's second book, UNHITTABLE: Baseball's Greatest Pitching Seasons, is due to be published in early 2002. He lives a life of recluse abandon in a redwood forest in California.

Product Details

• Paperback: 274 pages
• Publisher: Charles April Pubns (April 14, 2000)
• Language: English
• ISBN-10: 0965442489
• ISBN-13: 978-0967522104
• ASIN: 0967522102
• Product Dimensions: 8.4 x 5.6 x 0.6 inches
• Shipping Weight: 9.6 ounces
• Average Customer Review: 4.6 out of 5 stars  See all reviews (5 customer reviews)
• Amazon Best Sellers Rank: #1,579,978 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)

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Customer Reviews

Most Helpful Customer Reviews

5 of 5 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars Baseball's Most Mysterious Mascot, June 17, 2000

By 

Philio Stoane - See all my reviews

This review is from: Victory Faust: The Rube Who Saved McGraw's Giants (Paperback)

Gabriel Schechter's "Victory Faust - The Rube Who Saved McGraw's Giants" explores the tale of one of baseball's oddest characters. The near mythical story of Charles "Victory" Faust, an unknown hayseed who went from the obscurity of a Kansas farm to the toast of the New York baseball world, is set forth in detail. Using newspaper accounts and considerable original research, Schechter has crafted a fascinating portrait of the sport during the period just before the first World War. It was a time and a game of innocence and superstition, filled with legends such as Giants' manager John McGraw and pitcher Christy Mathewson, when the "impossible" was possible. In the history of baseball no story is more improbable than that of "Victory" Faust, the hick who became a flesh and blood good luck charm for the New York Giants. The author is able to put the reader in a box seat to history and breathe life into Faust's touching quest to actually pitch in a big league game. This book provides a fascinating read for those interested in a glimpse into early 20th century America, fan or non-fan alike.

4 of 4 people found the following review helpful:

4.0 out of 5 stars "Victory Faust" entertaining and disturbing, June 27, 2000

By 

R J Lesch (Des Moines, IA United States) - See all my reviews

This review is from: Victory Faust: The Rube Who Saved McGraw's Giants (Paperback)

This book tells a deeply amusing and haunting story of fame, obsession and delusion -- on the part of Faust, the simple mascot who believed he was a ballplayer, and on that of the Giants, the team who egged him on for their own amusement and benefit.

Schechter also gives us a richly detailed account of National League baseball in 1911. We see the players, the owners, and especially such reporters as Damon Runyon and Sid Mercer, as vividly as we see baseball's characters today.

3 of 3 people found the following review helpful:

5.0 out of 5 stars Certainly A Unique Subject For A Book, November 25, 2001

By 

C. W. Emblom "Bill Emblom" (Ishpeming, Michigan USA) - See all my reviews
(TOP 1000 REVIEWER)    (REAL NAME)   

Amazon Verified Purchase

This review is from: Victory Faust: The Rube Who Saved McGraw's Giants (Paperback)

Rightfully so, baseball produces more great books than any other sport. Author Gabriel Schechter has provided us with a truly unique subject in Charley Faust, a Kansas farmer who visited a fortune teller who told him if he would join the New York Giants they would win the pennant. Ballplayers were terribly superstitious and manager John McGraw took him along with the team as a good luck charm during the 1911 season. These were the Giants of Mathewson, Marquard, Merkle, Meyers, and Snodgrass among others. I was aware of the basic details of the Charley Faust story, but it was very interesting to read in greater detail about this story in baseball history. The players humored Charley in regard to his pitching abilities, but Charley regarded himself as a legitimate pitcher. Charley did get to pitch near the end of the 1911 season which put him into the baseball record book with everyone else whoever played the game. Faust as a good luck charm, however, didn't last into the World Series against the Philadelphia Athletics of Connie Mack and his $100,000 infield which defeated the Giants. During 1912 Charley Faust became more of a pest than a good luck charm and he eventually drifted off to the state of Washington where he died in 1915 from tuberculosis. Anything about John McGraw's Giants is interesting reading, but to have a book about the Charley Faust story hits a subject that has been ignored until now. The author did a great deal of research on his subject and includes various colorful articles on great writers of the time such as Damom Runyon, Sid Mercer, and others. A casual fan with an interest in baseball history will enjoy it.