Buster

Actually, He Should Have Been Nicknamed "The Yankee Clapper"

As a postscript to our story about Joe DiMaggio’s hostile attitude and malingering ways during his military tenure, U.S. Army personnel records reveal that the baseball star was formally discharged after he was diagnosed with “Pyschoneurosis Not Resulting From Combat.”

The New York Yankees star was discharged a few months after two Washington pols lobbied on his behalf with Army brass, documents show. In one conversation for which a transcript was prepared, Senator Albert “Happy” Chandler asked a general to review DiMaggio’s case and see if the athlete was medically fit to remain in the armed forces.

In the May 1945 call, Chandler, who had just been named baseball’s commissioner but was still serving in the Senate, claimed that DiMaggio had “sacrificed a great deal.” To which the Army commander replied, “He is a neurotic individual too.”

The Army documents also note that DiMaggio disclosed that he had a bout of gonorrhea in 1938, with “no recurrence.” This revelation, of course, will now require the issuance of revised editions of 742 Marilyn Monroe biographies.

Comments (1)

sknifeman/RicardoCabeza Williams flew the F9 in Korea, but he never was carrier qualified (nothing he ever said or wrote suggested that he thought he'd missed out on something important) His Korean war service was like that of many other reservists; he stayed in the reserves because it allowed him to play with high-powered toys (the F4 Corsair) and because he was promised, sort of, that he'd never get recalled to active duty When he was called up he transitioned into jets - the F9