"I'm the Lucky One"

The Philadelphia Phillies are the black sheep of the National League. Only once in 25 years have they finished in the first division, only once in seven years have they finished better than last. Last fortnight the League decided to lend no more money to the hapless Phillies, bought out the controlling stock of President and Mrs. Gerald P. Nugent, who in a decade had run the club $250,000 in debt.

Customers for big-league ball clubs do not grow on trees. But scarcely had the ink dried on the Nugents' check (guestimate: $39,000) when a half-dozen syndicates were scrambling for the Philly franchise. After several days Manhattan Socialite William Drought Cox, 33-year-old lumber broker who lost a reported $40,000 in the defunct New York Yankee professional football team, chirped up: "I'm the lucky one."

Branch Rickey, Brooklyn Dodgers' boss, known and revered as "The Brain" in baseball circles, agreed with Cox. Said Rickey: "At the price [some $230,000], the lowest asked for a National League club in baseball history . . . there is a chance to get rich within ten years. . . . The new owners must be ready with enterprise, working capital, management, gameness, the spirit of adventure. . . . Even if the war stops baseball for a couple of seasons, the value of the Philadelphia club would be enhanced. . . . After two years of inactivity all the clubs would start from scratch."

Cox was not sole purchaser of the Phillies. He heads a syndicate which includes nine other businessmen willing to take a chance.

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