The Chicago Cub Shot for Love: A Showgirl's Crime of Passion and the 1932 World Series by Jack Bales

Abstract

Reviewed by: The Chicago Cub Shot for Love: A Showgirl's Crime of Passion and the 1932 World Series by Jack Bales Mark Jent Jack Bales. The Chicago Cub Shot for Love: A Showgirl's Crime of Passion and the 1932 World Series. Charleston, SC: The History Press, 2021. 142 pp. Paperback, $21.99. Ninety years after his major league debut, the story of Billy Jurges's life and career has been dusted off the shelf by Jack Bales in The Chicago Cub Shot for Love. In the summer of 1932, the Cubs were in the heat of the National League pennant race led by Jurges, their second-year shortstop. Little did the Cubs know that a showgirl, a revolver, a midseason trade, and Babe Ruth's called shot during the World Series would not only come to define their season but that the complexity of the story would continue to be uncovered and written about nearly a century later. Although Jurges may seem like another obscure footnote in baseball history, he had a remarkable life on and off the diamond. Growing up in Brooklyn, he only played sandlot baseball during his youth. It was not until after high school while playing semipro ball in Queens that he caught a scout's attention. Signed by the Cubs, Jurges played in the minor leagues from 1927 to 1930 in Manchester (NH) and Reading (PA) before being called up to Wrigley Field in May 1931. This would be the beginning of an incredible career in baseball as a player, coach, manager and scout. For one to understand the full magnitude of this most interesting story, one must take a closer look at Jurges's five decades in baseball. He played seventeen seasons for the Cubs and Giants (1931–47), accumulated over 1,600 hits, was a three time All-Star, was the league's best defensive shortstop four times and played in three World Series. Jurges was teammates with numerous players who now have plaques in Cooperstown: Rogers Hornsby, Dizzy Dean, Carl Hubbell, Joe Medwick, Mel Ott, and Hack Wilson. In his three World Series appearances (1932, 1935, 1938) with the Cubs, he played against Joe DiMaggio, Lou Gehrig, Hank Greenberg and Babe Ruth. He was a Cub in 1937 when the iconic scoreboard was installed and the ivy was planted on the outfield bricks. Jurges managed Ted Williams in parts of two seasons (1959–60) as the skipper for the Red Sox. He was so respected around the game that he became a scout for the Orioles, Mets, Colt 45's, Senators, Mariners and Cubs. Despite all his accomplishments and accolades, Jurges's place in baseball history is widely known for what took place in room 509 at Hotel Carlos in Chicago on the morning of July 6, 1932. It was there that a young, vivacious brunette, Violet Popovich walked into his room with a revolver and shot him three times, striking him in his left hand and his right side. She was struck by a bullet in her left hand amidst a struggle for the gun. Jurges's teammates, doctors, [End Page 293] hotel staff and even newspaper reporters with cameras in hand all converged into the hotel room within minutes. Neither Jurges nor Popovich had life-threatening injuries. The jilted lover's story was that she went to commit suicide due to Jurges's lack of interest in a relationship, but when the struggle ensued, she accidentally shot him. (Jurges's Cubs teammates who came to his assistance made it to Wrigley Field in time for the game and beat the Phillies 6–1 that afternoon!) The Windy City was shocked by the front-page headlines that its short-stop had been shot by a showgirl. After being released from the hospital four days later, Jurges was back at the ballpark recovering from his injuries. Like a scene from a movie, that day Popovich "sat near the Brooklyn dugout, but had a view of the open side of the Cub dugout in which sat her favorite target, Bill Jurges" (40). Bales provides intimate insight into the brief Jurges-Popovich relationship, from beginning to end, which led to that fateful...