Where Have You Gone, Joe Dimaggio?

Where Have You Gone?

by Maury Allen

Story of Joe DiMaggio, one of the biggest sports stars of the 20th century.

Genres: Baseball, Sports, Biography

222 pages, Hardcover

First published January 1, 1975

Reviews

[Craig Strang · Rating 3 out of 5]

Fun to read, this is mostly a compilation of 1970s interviews with people who knew Joe DiMaggio. They mainly repeat and reinforce the same themes and tell the same stories from multiple perspectives, but the portrait becomes continuously more clear and nuanced as they unfold. Fascinating that nearly every biography of a Black athlete is filled with social justice themes, the challenges, hatred, barriers they experienced, how they overcame them (or didn’t), how they dedicated themselves to giving back and making it easier for kids coming up behind them, and how their lives and messages ultimately came to be about more than sports. DiMaggio, like most White athletes, had the luxury of being just a baseball player. He had an interesting and sometimes complicated life, and a tragic marriage, but he was always a baseball player until he was a former baseball player who spoke out only on behalf of a bank and a coffee pot maker!

[Charles · Rating 4 out of 5]

While there is no question that Joe DiMaggio was one of the smoothest, most natural baseball players of all time, these descriptions of his life in and out of baseball often go over the top. This book is largely a collection of retrospectives of people that knew and played with him. From club owner Toots Shor to his fellow Yankees, they universally praise DiMaggio, his skill in all aspects of baseball to his behavior off the field.
There is some mention of his marriage to Marilyn Monroe, which is where there is some negativity. DiMaggio is depicted as a very jealous husband that resented the attention Marilyn received as well as the expectations her managers and the public expected of her. There is even a hint that he physically struck her.
This book was published in 1975, before the sports books describing professional athletes reached the complete tell-all phase. DiMaggio is depicted as a hero that did little wrong, both on and off the field. There is almost no mention of the times when he was booed by the fans at Yankee Stadium, something that happened to all of the stars, including Mickey Mantle.

[Sully Augustine · Rating 4 out of 5]

4 stars out of 5 - I read an old paperback that has been around here for decades over the past couple of evenings. Its subject is one of baseball's biggest stars, but it is really about how things were in the America of the 1930's, 40's, and 50's, and the toll immense fame exacts on a fundamentally shy person who is fanatically devoted to and preternaturally good at his craft. The author is as much a worshipper of the almost mythical Joe DiMaggio as those he interviews and excerpts, but that doesn't prevent the inevitable flaws of the man from being visible behind the gauzy film of adulation.

[Brad Partridge · Rating 5 out of 5]

This was a great book on the life of Joe Dimaggio. Much of the stories are from people who knew Joe throughout his life.

[Phil Hardin · Rating 4 out of 5]

Through many interviews Maury. Allen put together a very comprehensive look at Joe D.

[Shane Barber]

It's a little slow reading in parts...doesn't flow great but gives a good perspective on Mag.

[Ronald · Rating 4 out of 5]

read some time in 1977