56 (Joe DiMaggio and the Last Magic Number in Sports)

“The era, the ballplayer and the record are all laid out beautifully. . . . The tension of the times is matched by the pressure of the streak.” —San Francisco Chronicle

It was the baseball season of 1941, and with Babe Ruth retired and Lou Gehrig ailing, the Yankees weren’t playing like the Yankees anymore. The team seemed vulnerable—just like the rest of the world, as war loomed and an American military draft seemed imminent. Even Joe DiMaggio, the Yankee Clipper himself, was in a slump.

Then, on a May afternoon at Yankee Stadium, DiMaggio lined a hard single to left field. It was the quiet beginning to the most resonant baseball achievement of all time. Starting that day, the vaunted Yankee center fielder kept on hitting—at least one hit in game after game after game.

Even as apprehension about the nation’s entry in the war intensified, Americans found themselves captivated by DiMaggio’s astonishing hitting streak. In Kostya Kennedy’s evocative account, Joe DiMaggio comes alive as a twenty-six-year-old on the brink of becoming the greatest baseball player of his time, even as the spotlight on his celebrity—and the public scrutiny that comes with it—grows with each game.

Alongside the story of DiMaggio’s dramatic feat, Kennedy deftly examines the nature of hitting streaks and the sheer improbability of DiMaggio’s, which only heightens the magic of his stunning accomplishment—one of the greatest sports records of all time.

“The best baseball book in many a season.” —Roger Kahn, author of The Boys of Summer

“Kennedy combines the sweep of a historian, the narrative power of a novelist and the passion of a fan.” —Newsday