Yesterday I highlighted Murray Chass’ poorly-sourced hatchet job against Stan Musial. The leadoff in that hatchet job was Chass’ claim -- based on a story Curt Flood allegedly told Marvin Miller who told Chass -- was that Flood was refused service at Stan Musial’s restaurant some time in the 1960s because Flood was black. Chass’ wrapup to that was to assert that Musial is “someone who discriminated against blacks,” and is thus unworthy of our adulation. His headline: Stan Musial is “no man of honor.”
Last night, a commenter shed a little more light on that story. And I’m inclined to feature his comment because that man’s name is Curt Flood, Jr. His comment:Let me say at the outset that I have been in Musial’s company on several occasions. I once even sat next to him at a Cardinals Old Timers Game” in the dugout at the old Busch Stadium for about an an hour. He was warm, gracious and said things about my father that were beautiful. He also graciously signed everything that i could find that was not nailed down. Stan Musial is a good, decent and honorable man.
I have not read Mr. Chass’s blog, however, the incident DID in fact happen to my father and my mother. But according to my parents, Mr. Musial was not in the restaurant. His doorman that night called Mr. Musial by telephone, but by the time it could rectified, my parents were pretty much fed up with not being fed up.
Best,
Curt Flood, Jr.
Shabby treatment of a black man at that time in our history is, regrettably, not surprising. That Chass used a third-hand telling of that story to conclude that Stan Musial “discriminated against blacks” -- and that he did so while failing to contact either Stan Musial or anyone who could tell Curt Flood’s side of it, such as Curt Flood, Jr., for example -- is reprehensible.
Thank you, Curt Flood, Jr., for telling us more in a simple email than Murray Chass -- an alleged journalist -- did with his “reporting.”