Butchertown

Shortly after celebrating his sixty-first birthday in March 1958, Lefty O'Doul invited a friend of his, sportswriter Harry Brundidge, for a stroll along the streets of San Francisco. O'Doul was, as always, in excellent spirits and chattered incessantly; he was excited that his old team, the New York Giants, had pulled up stakes and was about to open the new baseball season in his hometown. Recently retired after forty years in professional baseball, the two-time National League batting champion, legendary hitting instructor, and successful Minor League manager would soon be opening a restaurant on Geary Street bearing his name, around the corner from a pub he had owned in the 1940s.

As the two men strode through historic Union Square, Brundidge noted O'Doul's always impeccable appearance — this day his sartorial selection featuring an alpine hat with a feather and a herringbone jacket — and marveled at his friend's countenance, which made him appear twenty years younger than he had the right to. O'Doul was on a first-name basis with world-famous athletes, movie stars, and politicians, and the city seemed to belong to him — San Francisco Examiner columnist Charles Einstein famously wrote about O'Doul's habit of riding in the front seat of taxis and steering the driver to destinations based on route instructions that were always the most direct, if not always the most legal. In those circumstances, police would invariably halt the vehicle until spotting O'Doul, at which point an officer would smile and wave the driver on his way.

It appeared to Brundidge that the city was devoid of strangers; O'Doul recognized everyone crossing his path — and they him — as he greeted each person by name and spoke softly in rapid, staccato half-sentences, punctuating their delivery with animated facial expressions. Brundidge began to understand why San Francisco Seals owner Charlie Graham had dreaded walking down the street with Lefty O'Doul — it wasn't a walk so much as a never-ending series of interruptions. O'Doul had an easy air about him — a generous spirit that shone through; people were genuinely glad to see him. Brundidge thought to himself that the best word to describe his friend was "dynamic."

During their stroll, O'Doul and Brundidge were suddenly hailed by a group of Japanese businessmen who removed their hats and bowed. "O'Doul-san!" shouted one of the men, clearly delighted at encountering the baseball star. "Konnichiwa!" O'Doul bowed in turn and was introduced to the man's associates.

They shook hands and continued to exchange pleasantries in Japanese. Before parting, the man who had first greeted O'Doul turned to Brundidge and, after apologizing for his rudeness in not addressing him earlier, told the reporter, "In [Japan], O'Doul-san is great national hero. O'Doul [is number one] in Nipponese hearts. Great hero. O'Doul most admired American, including [the] illustrious MacArthur-san."

Lefty O'Doul had visited Japan more than a dozen times as a player and ambassador for the game, including momentous trips in 1931 and 1934 — the latter headlined by Babe Ruth — and in 1949, when he was asked to help repair U.S.-Japanese relations with a baseball tour. Brundidge remembered arriving in Tokyo in 1945, shortly after the surrender of Japan, and being peppered with questions from Japanese citizens, including Emperor Hirohito's brother, wanting to know about Lefty O'Doul. Prince Fumimaro Konoe, who twice served as Japanese prime minister, told Brundidge that O'Doul should have been a diplomat rather than a ballplayer.

Pleasantries concluded, the Japanese businessmen continued on their way, as did O'Doul and Brundidge. While they walked, Brundidge remained struck by the adulation accorded O'Doul in his hometown by men who had traveled several thousand miles and recognized him during a chance meeting on the street.

* * *

San Francisco was a young city full of ambition in the late 1860s. It was rough — not only around the edges, but through and through — and when its aspiration to become a major metropolis collided with the incompatibility of unsightly industries located within its city limits, especially butchering and meatpacking (and the unpleasant by-products), pressure was brought to force the butchers, prosperous though they were, to leave. City fathers acquiesced, banning the slaughtering of animals within the town proper, compelling the meat merchants to relocate their livelihood to marshy land purchased from the state of California, at the outlet of Islais Creek — a former Ohlone fishing spot just southeast of the city on what was known as Hunter's Point. The area was almost immediately dubbed "Butchertown."

The move proved fortuitous, as San Francisco quickly became a center for the beef industry, which employed more than three thousand people; one company, Miller & Lux, emerged as one of the largest meatpacking operations west of Chicago. The old problems resurfaced, however. Despite the natural barrier of Potrero Hill, which hid many of the less desirous aspects of Butchertown, within a few years the muck, the dung, and the stench and pollution from the slaughterhouses, tanneries, and tallow works spawned concern on the part of city officials. Instead of cleaning up and properly disposing of the offal produced by their trade, butchers often extended their slaughterhouses out over the ocean, filling the water with bloody remains that — sometimes — washed out to sea. Rats proved a constant problem, and hogs were often stationed under the wooden floors to devour carcasses dropped into the basement. This was an embarrassment to officials attempting to convert their city from a roughshod, ramshackle outpost into the "Paris of the Western Hemisphere," as San Francisco began vying for the coveted, and lucrative, role of trade center to Asia and the Pacific Rim. There would be repeated crackdowns.

Butchertown also produced Lefty O'Doul — nearly all of his family members were butchers. Lefty's paternal grandfather, Augustus, was born in Louisiana to parents of French and Italian ancestry and had come to California to make his fortune. For a time, Augustus partnered with his cousin and fellow bayou native Emile Peguillan in a sheep butchering concern. O'Doul's grandmother, Catherine Fitzgerald, was born in Ireland — family lore has Catherine insisting Augustus add a proper Irish apostrophe to his last name of Odoul before she would marry him.

Lefty O'Doul's father, Eugene, was born in 1872, the second of...