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Alumnus to sign new baseball biography Saturday

By David Gonnerman '90
May 21, 2008

Tom Swift '95, author of Chief Bender's Burden, will sign copies of his new book from 11 a.m. to 1 p.m., Saturday, May 24, at the St. Olaf Bookstore. He is one of 14 alumni authors who will sign books in the bookstore Saturday during Celebration Weekend.

SwiftTom95
Swift
The book tells the story of Charles Albert Bender, the first Minnesota-born man in the National Baseball Hall of Fame and the most successful American Indian baseball player of all time. Using a trademark delivery, an assortment of pitches (that may have included the game's first slider) and an unflappable demeanor, Bender earned a reputation as baseball's foremost clutch pitcher in front of World Series crowds.

"But the book is about more than baseball, as Bender's career unfolded in the face of immeasurable prejudice," says Swift. "This complete account of Bender's life is also a portrait of greatness of character maintained despite incredible pressure -- of how a celebrated man thrived while carrying an untold weight on his shoulders."

"A wonderful and impressively thorough new biography," writes a reviewer in the Chicago Sun-Times. "Swift's mission is to reassert Bender as an important figure in the history of the game, both as a player and a groundbreaking figure. His book does well in both ways."

"In Swift's hands, Bender's life unfolds gradually, as though he were a character in a novel, and the prejudice he experienced, though never justified, is set within the context of the times," writes Wes Lukowsky of Booklist. "[It's] carefully researched -- and documented -- as well as stylishly written (uncommon in the genre)."

Contact David Gonnerman at 507-786-3315 or gonnermd@stolaf.edu.