"The boy has a great future in the game." – Casey Stengel, on Warren Spahn, 1942 (the year I was born)

NO I'M NOT WRITING THIS posthumously. Still on the right side of the sod (green side up), but lately I've been re-posting some of my old columns that apply today even better than ever (re the Sixties hippies in 1860s Russia, for example).

Speaking of old, some people may think, "Why bother reading anything by a geezer who never published anything before age 60?" That part is true, except for letters to the editor and some writing for the Badger Herald, but as I say on Facebook, Methuselah never accomplished much until he turned 900. Just to make a point.

Satchel Paige pitched for the Indians when he was about 50 (he claimed to not know how old he was exactly). Colonel Sanders didn't start killing chickens until later in life. Bing Crosby started a new family late in life. George Blanda was a miracle-working quarterback in his late 40s. As a kid in 1961, I was listening to the game when Warren Spahn threw a no-hit-hitter at age 40.

"On April 28, 1961, five days after his fortieth birthday, Warren Spahn beat the Giants 1-0 . . He had pitched his first no-hit game in 1960 at age 39." – from "NO-HITTER" by Phil Pepe, 1968, Scholastic Books

I saw Spahn hit a homer on opening day in 1960. Point is, why quit? I started working on the farm in 1946, before "Number 42" broke the color barrier – and old farmers never go out to pasture – unless they "move to town" to die, which happens.

But what does all this have to do with the year 2020? I'm just filling in some context for generations X, Y, and Z. We need you seniors especially to stand up and speak out. We know more than the college kids because we've had 60 or 70 years' head start on them! Don't be afraid to write letters to the editor or give your opinions on Facebook. Put a bumper sticker on your car. Don't just sit there on your phone. Do something.

Go for it. Someone said that if you "save just one life," you will add ten years to your own. And people are paying attention on social media whereas they used to avoid the news like the plague. We are seeing "life and death" type news, and the life you save may be your OWN !!

P.S. "In the 1958 World Series, [Spahn] pitched a two-hit shutout against the New York Yankees in the fourth game, and his mastery over the Bombers was so convincing it prompted veteran sports columnist Red Smith to comment:

PPS: It's time we routed the media and academania to take back the America we used to know.