One More Miracle: The Groundbreaking Media Campaign of John “Mets” Lindsay

Abstract

John Lindsay, the mayor of New York City from 1966 to 1973, developed an innovative media strategy for his underdog reelection campaign in 1969. A Yale graduate with a patrician image, Lindsay sought to win over middle-class voters by associating with the New York Mets during the baseball team's unlikely march to the World Series. When the “Miracle Mets” clinched the pennant, Lindsay ventured into the delirious clubhouse and received a champagne shower from the players. Lindsay called the celebration “a nonpolitical event,” but newspaper photographs of the post-game revelry have been credited for Lindsay's subsequent victory at the polls. Lindsay's association with the Mets exemplifies an understudied period when politicians such as Richard Nixon, Robert F. Kennedy, and George McGovern used athletes as surrogates.

Notes

1 George Douris, “Lindsay Tightens Grip on City Hall,” Long Island Press, November 5, 1969, 1; and Jeff Greenfield, “The Second Toughest Job,” in America's Mayor: John V. Lindsay and the Reinvention of New York, ed. Sam Roberts (New York: Columbia University Press, 2010), 152–53.

2 Edward O'Neill, “Lindsay Could Win No. 2 GOP Spot in 1972,” New York Daily News, November 5, 1969, 4.

3 “Notes on the Election,” The Nation, November 17, 1969, 522.

4 Fun City Revisited: The Lindsay Years, WNET, May 6, 2010, written by Tom Casciato and Rob Issen; Edward Rothstein, “You Can Fight City Hall,” New York Times, May 14, 2010, C21; and Roberts, ed., America's Mayor.

5 Vincent J. Cannato, The Ungovernable City: John Lindsay and His Struggle to Save New York (New York: Basic Books, 2001); Joseph P. Viteritti, ed., Summer in the City: John Lindsay, New York, and the American Dream (Baltimore: Johns Hopkins University Press, 2014); and Sean Deveney, Fun City: John Lindsay, Joe Namath, and How Sports Saved New York in the 1960s (New York: Sports Publishing, 2015).

6 Cannato, The Ungovernable City, 420–39; and Greenfield, “The Second Toughest Job,” 152–68.

7 Cannato, The Ungovernable City, 436; and Greenfield, “The Second Toughest Job,” 167–68.

8 Many books have covered the miraculous turnaround of the 1969 Mets. See, for example, Stanley Cohen, A Magic Summer: The ’69 Mets (New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1988).

9 Cannato, The Ungovernable City, 436; and Greenfield, “The Second Toughest Job,” 167–68.

10 Cannato, The Ungovernable City, 436; and Greenfield, “The Second Toughest Job,” 167–68. Also, Lindsay appears at 2:33:00 in “1969 World Series, Game 5: Orioles @ Mets,” YouTube video, 2:36:07, from Game 5 of the 1969 World Series televised by NBC on October 16, 1969, posted by “MLBClassics,” last updated September 25, 2010, accessed November 8, 2016, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WbCWUehZKVU.

11 John V. Lindsay, The City (New York: W.W. Norton, 1970), 40.

12 Greenfield, “The Second Toughest Job,” 153; and Robert Mindlin, “Leviss Easy Victor, JVL Takes Queens,” Long Island Press, November 5, 1969, 1.

13 Cannato, The Ungovernable City, 155.

14 Ibid., 395–97; and Nicholas Hirshon, “Lindsay vs. Boro: Exhibit Recalls How ’69 Snowstorm Cemented Mayor's Place in Infamy,” New York Daily News, May 23, 2010, 33.

15 Jim O'Grady, “In Embattled Mayoralty of John Lindsay, Lessons for De Blasio,” WNYC, January 15, 2014, http://www.wnyc.org/story/embattled-mayoralty-john-lindsay-lessons-de-blasio/.

16 Cannato, The Ungovernable City, 420.

17 Jimmy Breslin, “Is Lindsay Too Tall to Be Mayor?,” New York, July 28, 1969, 24; and “The Liberal,” Newsday, October 20, 1969, 26.

18 Breslin, “Is Lindsay Too Tall to Be Mayor?”

19 Cannato, The Ungovernable City, 403, 409; and Greenfield, “The Second Toughest Job,” 153.

20 Ibid., 398. For more on Aurelio's background, see Patrick Brasley, “Portrait of a Mayor-maker,” Newsday, November 5, 1969, 22.

21 Ibid., 414–15.

22 Committee to Re-Elect John Lindsay, “If These Leading Democrats Can't Convince You to Vote for Mayor Lindsay…,” Advertisement, New York Times, November 3, 1969, 51.

23 Richard Aurelio, telephone interview by the author, January 30, 2015.

24 “The Bucs Heist Series and the Lid Blows Off,” Life, October 24, 1960, 35; and Joseph M. Sheehan, “Wet Towels Fly in Buc Quarters,” New York Times, October 14, 1960, 36.

25 James Q. Wilson, “The Mayor's Dilemmas II: The Mayors vs. the Cities,” Public Interest 16 (Summer 1969): 36–37.

26 George Minot Jr., “Nats Lose Opener to Yanks, 8–4,” Washington Post, April 8, 1969, A1; and Zachary D. Rymer, “How MLB's Presidential First-pitch Tradition Got Started and Evolved to Today,” Bleacher Report, March 30, 2014, http://bleacherreport.com/articles/2008902-how-mlbs-presidential-1st-pitch-tradition-got-started-and-evolved-to-today. In a telephone interview on February 19, 2015, sportswriter Dave Kaminer, who covered the Mets in the 1969 playoffs for the Yonkers (NY) Herald Statesman, noted the difference between a politician merely throwing out a first pitch and identifying with a team as strongly as Lindsay did: “Politicians were not known to be sports fans. They'd come out on Opening Day. They'd throw out a ball. And they'd wear a coat and look around. By the fifth inning, if they could sneak out they would. But I'd like to think that Lindsay was so smart that he realized there was the ultimate bandwagon going through.”

27 Clifford Geertz, “Deep Play: Notes on the Balinese Cockfight,” Daedalus 101, no. 1 (1972): 26.

28 Michael Oriard, Reading Football: How the Popular Press Created an American Spectacle (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 1993).

29 Steven M. Gelber, “Working at Playing: The Culture of the Workplace and the Rise of Baseball,” Journal of Social History 16, no. 4 (1983): 3–22; and Steven A. Riess, Touching Base: Professional Baseball and American Culture in the Progressive Era (Chicago: University of Illinois Press, 1999), 4.

30 Michael Hiestand, “Entering the Political Arena: Ex-Athletes, Sports People Get in the Game for Bradley,” USA Today, November 10, 1999, 1C.

31 “Bunning Makes Political Pitch,” St. Petersburg (FL) Independent, September 15, 1977, 2C; Frank Dolson, Jim Bunning: Baseball and Beyond (Philadelphia: Temple University Press, 1998), 104; Andrew L. Johns, Vietnam's Second Front: Domestic Politics, the Republican Party, and the War (Lexington: University Press of Kentucky, 2010), 210–11; and “Party Figures Ask Phone Peace; Athletes for Nixon Group Organized,” Washington Post, July 13, 1968, A2.

32 Citizens for Kennedy, Advertisement, New York Times, May 15, 1968, 26.

33 Dave Brady, “Grier in Shock Following Ordeal,” Washington Post, June 6, 1968, C5.

34 Al Harvin, “Fumble by Bills Opens Way to 41–3 Triumph,” New York Times, November 13, 1972, 49, 51; and “Performing under Pressure,” Poster, 1972, ID Number 64777.PO0023, Political Americana Collection, Cornell University Library.

35 Christopher Lydon, “Celebrities Rally behind McGovern,” New York Times, April 2, 1972, 28; and Kenneth Denlinger, “Candidates Woo Athletes,” Washington Post, October 14, 1972, C3.

36 Denlinger, “Candidates Woo Athletes.”

37 Woody Klein, Lindsay's Promise: The Dream That Failed (London: Macmillan, 1970), 28.

38 Miriam Greenberg, Branding New York: How a City in Crisis Was Sold to the World (New York: Routledge, 2008), 55.

39 Joseph Durso, “Mets Commit 5 Errors while Bowing to Pirates, 6–3, in Opening Game Here,” New York Times, April 12, 1967, 52; Gerald Eskenazi, “Wagner Makes Pitch for the Past at Shea Stadium,” New York Times, April 16, 1966, 51; Leonard Koppett, “Bryan, Pepitone Belt Key Homers: Ford Pitches Three Innings and Is Winner—Lindsay Booed at Shea Stadium,” New York Times, June 28, 1966, 53; and Leonard Koppett, “Mets Top Yanks, 4–0, with 5-Hitter,” New York Times, July 13, 1967, 44.

40 “New York Mets Team History & Encyclopedia,” Sports Reference LLC, accessed November 8, 2016, http://www.baseball-reference.com/teams/NYM/.

41 Cohen, A Magic Summer, 1, 16.

42 James F. Murray to John V. Lindsay, March 11, 1969, box 83, folder 849, MS 592, John Vliet Lindsay Papers, Yale University Library Manuscripts and Archives (hereafter cited as Lindsay Papers).

43 Tom Babe to Jim Carberry, memorandum, April 7, 1969, box 83, folder 849, MS 592, Lindsay Papers.

44 Memorandum to John V. Lindsay, April 7, 1969, box 83, folder 849, MS 592, Lindsay Papers.

45 Ibid.; and Dave Anderson, “Jets Upset Colts by 16–7 for Title in the Super Bowl,” New York Times, January 13, 1969, 1.

46 Bruce Weber, “House Divided: A Night for ‘Go Yanks!’ and ‘Go Mets!,’” New York Times, June 17, 1997, B9; and “Batter Up! The Battle of New York is at Hand,” New York Times, October 21, 2000, A14.

47 “1969 American League Season Summary,” Sports Reference LLC, accessed November 8, 2016, http://www.baseball-reference.com/leagues/AL/1969.shtml.

48 Aurelio, telephone interview.

49 George Douris, “Marchi Calls for War on Crime,” Long Island Press, October 2, 1969, 9.

50 George Douris, “Mayoralty Race Plays 2nd Fiddle to Mets,” Long Island Press, October 6, 1969, 3A; and Paul L. Montgomery, “City Is Attuned to Resounding Met Victory,” New York Times, October 7, 1969, 1, 55.

51 Montgomery, “City Is Attuned to Resounding Met Victory.”

52 “Plenty of Joy-Juice in Metsville,” Newsday, October 7, 1969, 4.

53 Patrick Vecchio, telephone interview with the author, February 6, 2015.

54 Montgomery, “City Is Attuned to Resounding Met Victory.”

55 Rod Gaspar, telephone interview with the author, January 30, 2015.

56 “But Happy,” New York Daily News, October 7, 1969, 83.

57 Montgomery, “City Is Attuned to Resounding Met Victory.”

58 Photographers captured two different angles of Lindsay's dousing by Gaspar and Grote. The same Associated Press wire photo appeared on the front page of the New York Times beneath the headline “Mets Sweep Playoff, Winning Pennant,” on page 4 of Newsday above “Plenty of Joy-juice in Metsville,” and in the sports pages of the New York Post, “Tomorrow, the World (Series),” 107, and Long Island Press, “One Giant Leap—for Metkind!,” 26. Another angle was published on the back page of the New York Daily News with the headline, “It's Mets A-Go-Go! Rout Braves, 7–4; O's Sweep, 11–2.” Among the city's dailies, the images were excluded only from the Wall Street Journal, which focused primarily on business and finance and did not run news photographs.

59 “One Giant Leap—for Metkind!”

60 The Lindsay photographs appeared on October 7, 1969, alongside “Mets Fans Wild after Victory,” Charleston (WV) Gazette, 1; “Mets, Orioles March toward World Series Clash,” Anderson (IN) Daily Bulletin, 10; Mike Rathet, “We're Gonna Win It All – Jones,” Daily Telegram (Eau Claire, WI); Mike Rathet, “Incredible Mets Sure They Will Win It All,” Hattiesburg (MI) American, 6; “It's Mets Versus Orioles after Sweeps in Playoffs,” Victoria (TX) Advocate; Mike Rathet, “‘Met Power’ Ruins Braves,” Yuma (AZ) Daily Sun; Arthur Daley, “Mets, Orioles in World Series,” Montana Standard (Butte, MT), 6; and “Amazing Mets, Orioles in World Series,” Oxnard (CA) Press-Courier, 12.

61 Murray Schumach, “Mets’ Euphoria Means All's Well in Flushing,” New York Times, October 8, 1969, 49.

62 Sid Davidoff, telephone interview with the author, February 2, 2015.

63 Schumach, “Mets’ Euphoria Means All's Well in Flushing.”

64 “Homeowners Hang Effigy of Lindsay,” Long Island Press, October 9, 1969, 44.

65 Leonard Koppett, “Mets Depart for Baltimore to the Accompaniment of Cheers, Music, and Poem,” New York Times, October 10, 1969, 59.

66 Ibid.; and Greenfield, “The Second Toughest Job,” 168.

67 Koppett, “Mets Depart for Baltimore to the Accompaniment of Cheers, Music, and Poem”; and Hal Shapiro, “Ode to Mets,” Long Island Press, October 10, 1969, 1.

68 Cohen, A Magic Summer, 265–66.

69 Shapiro, “Ode to Mets.”

70 Cohen, A Magic Summer, 275–77.

71 “Candidates Play a New Ball Game,” New York Times, October 15, 1969, 51.

72 Joseph Durso, “Mets, Led by Agee, Beat Orioles, 5–0; Lead 2–1 in Series,” New York Times, October 15, 1969, 1.

73 “Lindsay Auctions Mets' Ball,” Long Island Press, October 15, 1969, 2.

74 Cohen, A Magic Summer, 290–92.

75 “Sutton Accepts the Lindsay Button,” New York Daily News, October 17, 1969, 14.

76 Davidoff, telephone interview; and Cohen, A Magic Summer, 302.

77 Wes Gaffer and Tom Pugh, “5 Shea Fans Hospitalized in Wild Basebrawl Finish,” New York Daily News, October 17, 1969, 2; and Joe Trimble, “Bigger & Better Than Any Dodger Win, Says Hodges,” New York Daily News, October 17, 1969, 91.

78 Ben Gross, “What's On? The Bubbly Flows on TV after the Mets Triumph,” New York Daily News, October 17, 1969, 83; and “1969 World Series, Game 5: Orioles @ Mets,” YouTube video. The Daily News reported that more than four out of every five persons in the New York area were watching the World Series, so Lindsay's post-game drenching likely reached millions of voters.

79 John Lindsay Jr., telephone interview with the author, March 5, 2015.

80 Steve Jacobson, telephone interview with the author, February 19, 2015.

81 Fred Bruning, “Mets Melt New York's Cool on Day of Miracles and Madness,” Newsday, October 17, 1969, 4–5. The Post also reported Lindsay joining in the celebration. See Paul Zimmerman, “A Roomful of Haloes,” New York Post, October 16, 1969, 77.

82 Lindsay, The City, 40.

83 Jeff Greenfield, telephone interview with the author, February 7, 2015.

84 Jay Kriegel, telephone interview with the author, January 30, 2015.

85 Aurelio, telephone interview.

86 Bob Laird, telephone interview with the author, February 3, 2015.

87 Aurelio, telephone interview.

88 Davidoff, telephone interview.

89 Aurelio, telephone interview.

90 Gene Spagnoli, “Sliders, Sinkers, Fast Ones Flung at Al Smith Banquet,” New York Daily News, October 17, 1969, 5.

91 Ibid.; and Dennis Wainstock, Election Year 1968: The Turning Point (New York: Enigma Books, 2012), 157.

92 Spagnoli, “Sliders, Sinkers, Fast Ones Flung at Al Smith Banquet.”

93 Dick Zander, “‘Mets’ Lindsay Strikes Out for Laughs,” Newsday, October 17, 1969, 3B.

94 Cannato, The Ungovernable City; Deveney, Fun City; Roberts, America's Mayor; “The Poll Starts Tomorrow,” New York Daily News, October 17, 1969, 5; Viteritti, Summer in the City; and “We Begin Straw Poll Tomorrow,” New York Daily News, October 17, 1969, 50.

95 Ibid.; and Laird, telephone interview.

96 Thomas Poster, “Mario's Backers Count on Poll to Be Pro-Proc,” New York Daily News, October 18, 1969, 16.

97 Carl J. Pelleck and Steven Marcus, “Monday Is the Mets' Day,” New York Post, October 17, 1969, 2; Joseph Durso, “Hodges Is Overwhelming Choice as Manager of Year in National League,” New York Times, October 18, 1969, 40; “More Ticker Tape for Mets Monday,” New York Times, October 18, 1969, 40; “See the Champs,” Long Island Press, October 18, 1969, 1–2; and Dave Behrens and Pete Bowles, “City in a Carnival Mood for Mets Mardi Gras,” Newsday, October 20, 1969, 2.

98 “See the Champs.”

99 Joseph Durso, “Same Old City Hails New Mets Today,” New York Times, October 20, 1969, 66; Kay Gardella, “What's On? TV Takes Time for Mets; Laugh-in ‘Vulgar, Dirty,’” New York Daily News, October 21, 1969, 77.

100 William Travers and Arthur Mulligan, “Those Hail-Fellows Very Well Met!,” New York Daily News, October 21, 1969, 3. For photographs of Lindsay and Hodges with the street sign, see “Cinderella Has a Ball,” New York Daily News, October 21, 1969, 16–17, and Edward C. Burks, “Mets’ Stock Rise Causes Wall St. Paper Blizzard,” New York Times, October 21, 1969, 54.

101 Travers and Mulligan, “Those Hail-Fellows Very Well Met!”

102 Ibid.; and “Joy in Metsville,” New York Post, October 20, 1969, 78.

103 “Senator Percy Endorses Lindsay for Re-Election,” New York Times, October 22, 1969, 51.

104 Gene Spagnoli, “Lindsay Takes Lead in 1st News Poll,” New York Daily News, October 23, 1969, 2, 56.

105 Gabe Pressman, telephone interview with the author, January 30, 2015.

106 “1969 Campaign Commercials,” WNET, accessed November 8, 2016, http://www.thirteen.org/lindsay/video/sample-3/.

107 Greenfield, telephone interview. Rove was credited with the media strategies behind George W. Bush's successful presidential campaigns in 2000 and 2004, while Axelrod helped engineer Barack Obama's presidential campaign in 2008.

108 Aurelio, telephone interview.

109 The same advertisement appeared in at least two newspapers, the Times and the Press. See Committee to Re-Elect John Lindsay, “If These Leading Democrats Can't Convince You to Vote for Mayor Lindsay…,” Advertisement, New York Times, November 3, 1969, 51, and Committee to Re-Elect John Lindsay, “If These Leading Democrats Can't Convince You to Vote for Mayor Lindsay…,” Advertisement, Long Island Press, November 3, 1969, 18.

110 “Vote for New York” Press Release, August 21, 1969, box 139, folder 197, MS 592, Lindsay Papers; and Ron Swoboda, email to the author, March 5, 2015.

111 Ed Kranepool, telephone interview with the author, March 10, 2015.

112 Cannato, The Ungovernable City, 437. See also Harry Schlegel, “Mayor Bounces Back to Win,” New York Daily News, November 5, 1969, 3, 6; and “Candidates for Mayor,” New York Daily News, November 5, 1969, 6.

113 “The Results in Queens by Assembly Districts,” Long Island Press, November 5, 1969, 2.

114 Frank Lynn, “After Lindsay Win, What Next?,” Newsday, November 5, 1969, 5.

115 Davidoff, telephone interview. For more on the impact of Meir's visit, see Cannato, The Ungovernable City, 424–26; Greenfield, “The Second Toughest Job,” 159–62; and George Douris, “Lindsay Tightens Grip on City Hall,” Long Island Press, November 5, 1969, 1, 4.

116 Douris, “Lindsay Tightens Grip on City Hall”; and Sam Roberts, “The Region: Who Has to Do What as New York Prepares to Pick a New Mayor,” New York Times, October 22, 1989, E4. For more on the television commercial and Vietnam War moratorium, see Greenfield, “The Second Toughest Job,” 153–59.

117 Art Shamsky, telephone interview with the author, March 3, 2015.

118 Kranepool, telephone interview.

119 Gaspar, telephone interview.

120 Margaret Picotte, telephone interview with the author, March 12, 2015.

121 Cannato, The Ungovernable City, 500, 515–17, 520.

122 Frank Lynn, “Mayor Runs Sixth: Says Returns Indicate He Cannot Continue as a Candidate,” New York Times, April 5, 1972, 1.

123 Robert D. McFadden, “John V. Lindsay, Mayor and Maverick, Dies at 79,” New York Times, December 21, 2000, A1, B10–B11.

124 Dave Anderson, “McGraw Wins Guess Game,” New York Times, October 19, 1973, 29.

125 Lindsay appears about eighteen minutes into An Amazin’ Era: The New York Mets, produced by Peter Hanley, Rich Domich, Steven Stern, Mike Kostel, and Geoff Belinfante, Major League Baseball Productions, 1986, videocassette (VHS), 71 min.

126 McFadden, “John V. Lindsay.”

127 Zander, “‘Mets’ Lindsay Strikes Out for Laughs.”

128 This illustration appeared on the cover of the April 1970 issue of a short-lived monthly magazine named Jock. A copy is available in the archives at the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum, BHOF Serials, GV561.J6, Cooperstown, NY.

129 In the New York Times, columnist Robert Lipsyte acknowledged that Lindsay “came to baseball late, but often.” See Robert Lipsyte, “Sports of the Times: Merry Mets Day, Everyone,” New York Times, October 20, 1969, 66. Also, former Mayor Robert Wagner was quoted in Newsday skeptically commenting on the fandom of the three mayoral candidates who attended the World Series: “Well, you don't see them out here very often during the season.” See Al Cohn, “The Mets Are In—Very In, Darlin’,” Newsday, October 17, 1969, 1A, 9A. Lastly, veteran sportswriter Phil Pepe, who covered the 1969 Mets for the Daily News, said in a telephone interview on February 14, 2015, that he had never seen Lindsay around the Mets until they reached the playoffs: “So Lindsay shows up in the clubhouse to help celebrate the championship, which was kind of like out of character for him, and it was obvious he was doing it only to ride the tidal wave of euphoria and perhaps help him get reelected.”

130 Davidoff, telephone interview; and McFadden, “John V. Lindsay.”

131 Richard Mathieu, “Bob OKs Lindsay Bid to Act as a Screener,” New York Daily News, October 21, 1969, 5.

132 Ibid. The Daily News endorsed Marchi, while Procaccino's biggest newspaper endorsement came from the Spanish-language daily El Diario La Prensa. See also “The Lindsay Coalition,” New York Post (Daily Magazine Insert), October 16, 1969, 4; “Why Mr. Lindsay?,” Long Island Press, October 17, 1969, 24; George Douris, “Mario Asks Probe of ‘Criminals on City Payroll,’” Long Island Press, October 20, 1969, 2; George Douris, “Lindsay, Procaccino, Marchi Campaign Down to the Wire,” Long Island Press, November 3, 1969, 1, 6; and “The Post's Election Choices,” New York Post (Daily Magazine Insert), November 3, 1969, 1.

133 George Arzt, telephone interview with the author, January 19, 2015.

134 Mickey Carroll, telephone interview with the author, January 19, 2015.

135 Koch wrote that he was “not a sports fan” in Edward I. Koch, Citizen Koch: An Autobiography (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1992), 194. In addition, Koch's commissioner of parks and recreation, Gordon J. Davis, began a report to the mayor about a potential sale of the Mets in 1979 by acknowledging that Koch may have “absolutely no interest in professional baseball.” See Gordon J. Davis to Edward I. Koch and Nathan Leventhal, Semi-Monthly Report on Departmental Activities, November 15, 1979, box 206, folder 7, Edward I. Koch Documents Collection, Departmental Correspondence Series, LaGuardia and Wagner Archives, LaGuardia Community College, New York, NY.

136 “Let's Go Mets Music Video (1986),” YouTube video, 4:03, posted by “antmisk_ny,” April 15, 2009, accessed November 8, 2016, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Ymixm6PtVBA. Koch appears at 3:45.

137 Koch, Citizen Koch, 195.

138 “Mets Celebrate 1986 World Series Victory!,” YouTube video, 1:35, from NBC Nightly News televised by NBC on October 28, 1986, posted by “kylierocksful,” December 13, 2010, accessed November 8, 2016, https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QBzNheMUTVo.

139 Aurelio, telephone interview.