Happy Birthday Amby

He will turn 102 on April the 21st. As St. Patrick's Day is today, I hope that San Diego will honor you with a Schindler Day, and your number 24 hang on every flag pole. 

"George, I was the best athlete to come out of San Diego, and
 became the California Athlete of the Year for 1933 and 1934." 

From the summers of 2006 to 2008 Schindler and I lunched together either at the South Coast Grill off the  Hermosa Beach strand. Of course we began the day in his Torrance den before ambling off to a restaurant. 
I worked the microfilm computers mainly at the Central Library in Los Angeles as well as the libraries in Santa Monica and his birth city, San Diego. 
My folks subscribed to four  different Los Angles papers, of course at different times. I needed to embellish and verify his many stories, and so became engrossed in the events of the thirties. 
I became excited when to see the writers who helped me learn to read, since school never could. One story caught my eye from a 1936 edition of the Herald and Express. 
Sid Ziff of the Herald and Express wrote an article that what it takes to become a great athlete or  phenomenon. In one of his columns in 1936, he writes about Li'l Ambys work ethic and athletic ability.  
" Ambrose Schindler carried a paper route in San Diego. One afternoon, the San Diego High team came to Occidental for a track meet without Schindler who had to deliver his paper route...but Schindler showed up later in his battered Roadster blowing smoke...He won the high jump with a jump of 6 feet 2 inches."
     His story will change the lives of anybody that reads it. It gave mine a new beginning. The Trojans from the classes of the late thirties will come alive again if not in person than in spirit.  
     Remember that he became the 1940 Pasadena Rose Bowl Player of the Game and also the Chicago All Star Player of the game the same year 

The Pop Corn is ripe for eating and I have splashed gobs of butter on it. The story will  be made into a play and movie 

Schindler as told to me:  "The race between the rabbit and the turtle was won by the hair. It had a purpose.