2B
Wednesday, November 2, 1994
925 IOWA
841-7226
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DOUGLAS COUNTY
Rape Victim/ Survivor Service
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1419 Mass.
843-8985
STUDENT
SENATE
24 HOURS CALL 841-2345
thur nov 3 Larry
Orange Mothers
Hefter
frinov4
fri nov 2
Dead Eye Dick
with Judge Nothing
sat nov 5
Kelly Hunt
SPORTS UNIVERSITY DAILY KANSAN
Candidate Eric Schmidt and his former KU Track Coach Bob Timmie Timmons plan a winning race.
- Representing You and the University of Kansas
- LET'S PUT LAWRENCE BACK ON TRACK!!
- Running to insure KU remains the Premier Academic Institution.
LEADERSHIP FOR LAWRENCE
POLADV
CHRISTIE'S TOY BOX WHERE THE FUN BEGINS!
Paid for by Citizens to elect Eric Schmidt. Gina Burman, Treasurer.
- Hilarious Party Games
- Adult Novelties
- Unusual Greeting Cards
- Adult Novelties
- Sensuous Oils & Lotions
- Current Monthly Magazines
AIRFORCE ROTC
Rent 1 movie at regular price & get a 2nd movie for 1¢ EVERYDAY! 1206 W.23rd Lawrence Ks 842-4266
- Coed Naked & Big Johnson T-shirts & Hats
206 W. 23rd, Lawrence, Ks 842-4266
If you have a GPA of 2.5 or higher and are a full time student, you can qualify for an Air Force ROTC scholarship.In addition,you will receive $100.00 each academic month for your last two years of college. This scholarship is available to ANY ACADEMIC MAJOR. The deadline to apply for the fall 1994 semester is rapidily approaching. For more information on this exciting opportunity talk to Captain Dean Wilson or captain Bob Wicks at 864-4676.
GLENN BURKE: A BALLPLAYER'S STORY
AIDS, drugs fill life of talented baseball player
By Steve Wilstein The Associated Press
Oaldand, Calif. — Glenn Burke had been talking for an hour, the conversation drifting from AIDS to homosexuality to baseball. He began to doze off in his bed, worn out by disease and drugs, unsure of which was worse.
Suddenly, he opened his eyes, made an effort to smile for the camera and raised two fingers in a peace sign.
"I had a nice life," he said. "I can't complain. I don't have any regrets. Maybe one. I would have played basketball. Would've made it, too."
Peace comes at a steep price for Burke, who was once an outfielder for the Los Angeles Dodgers and the Oakland Athletics, a starter in a 1977 World Series game, and the man who invented the high-five that season.
"It's stuff they can never take away," Burke said. "It's in the books."
He had the voice of a dying man and purple Kaposi's sarcoma lesions on his grotesquely swollen feet. He stared at his sores then turned to the ceiling, squeezing his eyes shut, grinding his chipped teeth together and clenching his fists.
He had been thinking about suicide lately, not caring whether he reached the age of 42 on Nov.16.
"I'm ready," he said. "I'd rather go than to go through this pain much longer."
He still snorts cocaine, he said. He still did the drug that sent him to San Quentin prison a few years ago and reduced him to panhandling and wandering the streets of San Francisco, mooching off friends and turning them against him when he couldn't pay them back.
"I never stole nobody's money," he said. "If they gave me money, they gave me money and put it in my hand. I've done a lot, too. I used to give parties every year for 300 people, 400 people. Folks forget."
He had been doing it so long, he figured that cocaine didn't matter anymore. It got him high and helped deaden the pain, along with the pharmacy of prescription pills and potions on the night table in the small room of his sister Lutha's house. "I'm gonna die anyway," he said. "I'm gonna do what I want to do."
Burke looked scrawny and weak in a T-shirt, boxer shorts and socks. He lay curled on the bed without a blanket as autumn sunlight pierced through a window in the hot room.
The only strength he seemed to have left was in his arms and his bearded face, hollowed but still handsome, still unmarked by those terrible sores.
"If I get them on my face," he said, "it's time to go."
"A lot of the signs were there. You just don't want to see them
His feet were
lumpy and use-
less, riddled with
tumors, and he
sometimes."
Dusty Baker San Francisco Giants manager
had to drag himself on aluminium crutches to get out of bed.
His weight was down from 220 pounds as a player to 145 pounds. Soon he would begin radiation treatment, soon he would need a walker, soon a wheelchair, soon ...
--manager at the time, and one day he stood in front of the team in the dugout, looked straight at Burke and told them, "I don't want no faggot on my team." Burke took it in silence.
At least six other gay ballplayers were in the majors during the four years Burke played, he said, and there's more than that today. No one, except Burke, ever admitted it publicly, whether from fear or some other reason.
Burke came out in 1982, two years after he quit baseball when the A's didn't sign him again. Billy Martin was the
"I heard the name before," he said. "It was his stupidity."
Burke discovered his homosexuality at 23 in a liaison with his junior high school drama teacher, a man twice his age. Burke came away feeling awful at first, then utterly relieved.
"I found out what I was really about, and I went home
also "cried" also cried and cried in the bathroom," he said. "After that, I knew what I wanted."
Before that, Burke said, he had no sexual life, and he always was running away from girls and avoiding dates arranged by teammates.
Once Burke realized he was
"I just knew what I had to do. Play baseball, stay quiet and live my life."
Glenn Burke
Former L.A. Dodgers outfielder
gay, he understood that it was not all right to talk about it in the clubhouse.
"I just knew what I had to do," he said. "Play baseball, stay quiet and live my life."
And that's what he did. He wasn't the gay movement's Jackie Robinson, he wasn't baseball's Martina Navratilova, a star playing on his own terms, taking all the taunts, hearing the jokes in the locker room and all the time being the best.
Burke was a good prospect, a .300 or higher hitter five times in the minor leagues and an excellent center fielder who covered a lot of ground.
He once ran the 100-yard dash in 9.7 seconds, and at 5 feet 10 inches, he had the leaping ability to dunk a basketball with two hands. Jim Gilliam, the late Dodgers coach, touted him as the next Willie Mays, but when Burke reached the majors, he couldn't break into the talented outfield of Rick Monday, Reggie Smith and Dusty Baker.
"He could run low to the ground and be under control. The ball would get lower and lower, and he would just get lower and lower and run as fast as he was low to the ground. He struggled with his hitting at first, but that would have come along because he was strong. He was learning how to hit. It takes time."
"He was built like a young Willie Mills," said Baker, now the San Francisco Giants manager. "He would have been real good if he had the opportunity. I mean, Glenn could play, man. Let me tell you, he could run that ball down as good as anybody I played with. I amn't lying to you.
Burke's great misfortune was never getting enough of a chance to show how much better he could get and to prove what he could do with that heavyweight boxer's body. Lutha called him a man's man. His teammates called him King Kong.
At first, none of the Dodgers knew Burke was gay. He roomed with Smith one spring, and Smith didn't know. Burke went to nightclubs with his teammates, dined with them and never let on.
"He never made any passes," Baker said. "You never caught him ever looking at anybody. After a while you're around a guy long enough, you would think you're gonna see him do something that's out of the norm. But he never did. He was a fun-loving guy, a good guy.
"He could dance. He could hoop as good as anybody. And he could fight as good as anybody. The girls loved him. He'd dance with all the girls, but then he'd always come home by himself. A lot of the signs were there. You just don't want to see them sometimes."
STUDENT
THE UNIVERSITY OF KANSAS
SENATE
Announces: Applications are now being accepted for the
Student Legislative Awareness Board
Board Membership and Coordinator Positions
Applications are available in the Student Senate Office 410 Kansas Union. Application deadline is 5:00 PM Friday, November 4, 1994.
Questions?? Call 864-3710 for more information.