What a Creep
Season 24, Episode 10
The True Crime Story Behind “The Natural”
The Eddie Waitkus shooting is a notable event in baseball history. It occurred in 1949 when the popular first baseman (and WW2 hero) for the Philadelphia Phillies was shot by an obsessed fan named Ruth Steinhagen. The incident was a shocking reminder of the dangers of celebrity obsession. Also, it inspired Bernard Malamud’s novel The Natural, which was later adapted into a popular film starring Robert Redford (who played a 19-year-old when he was 47 at the time!).
Trigger Warnings: Gun violence, stalking, alcoholism, and mental health treatments
Sources for this episode:
- NPR: https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2013/03/18/174623312/stalker-who-inspired-the-natural-dies-lived-real-life-in-obscurity
- Baseball’s The Natural: The Story of Eddie Waitkus by John Theodore
- Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Eddie_Waitkus
- ·The Chicago History Museum: https://www.chicagohistory.org/shooting-of-eddie-waitkus/
- History and Relics: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=9n1HdPmg9oU
- Chicago PBS: https://www.pbs.org/video/chicago-tonight-march-15-2013-2006-eddie-waitkus-documentary/
Hunter Pence’s Coffee Company/Non-Profit: https://thepineapplelabs.com/
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