Some Thoughts About Gratitude

By CHARLES M. GUTHRIE
of the editorial page staff
published by the StarTribune
May 31, 1958

Stan Musial

   RECENTLY Stan Musial, star of the St. Louis Cardinals, gained immortality by making his 3000th major league hit.  The feat had been accomplished by only seven other players before him.
   Close on the heels of this accomplishment came the story of another deed by the same person.  It caused less fanfare and splash of printer's ink--and it didn't come from the modest Musial.  But it sheds additional light on why he's known as "Stan, the Man," and it redounds even more to his credit than did that pinch-hit double against the Chicago Cubs that put him in the select circle.

   FOR IT showed him as a man of character and generosity and great gift of appreciation.  He remembered his debt to Dickie Kerr, the little stout-hearted White Sox pitcher who beat Cincinnati twice in the scandal-scarred 1919 World Series.

Dickie Kerr

   Years later Kerr became manager of the Daytona Beach farm club for the Cardinals.  Among his charges was a skinny youth who aspired to be a pitcher but he showed small talent for it.  This was Stanley Musial, a mediocre southpaw whom Kerr recognized as a natural with a bat.
   Kerr took the sore-armed and discouraged youngster into his home, fed and befriended him and told him he could become a great hitter.
   Great hitter Musial proved to be.  He went on to fame and fortune but he didn't forget Kerr.  And because he didn't forget, the Kerrs now have a new home in Houston, Texas, a white bungalow provided by Musial.

   THE INCIDENT prompts some observations about gratitude.  Some harsh and cynical things have been said of it.  Robert Louis Stevenson termed it "but a lame sentiment," adding that "thanks, when they are expressed, are often more embarrassing than welcome."
   H.L. Mencken, never given to moderate expression, was harsher.  He wrote that to look for gratitude in this world was asinine.  "The truth is," he said, "that the sentiment itself is not human but doggish and the man who demands it in payment for his doings is precisely the sort of man who feels noble and distinguished when a dog licks his hand."
   Maybe Mencken meant it and maybe he was just being funny.  The sage of Baltimore was as much humorist as critic and philosopher and I suspect that Mencken, the humorist, was in command when these caustic lines were penned.

H.L. Mencken

   At least I prefer to go along with Samuel Johnson, who wrote a couple of hundred years ago that "gratitude is a fruit of great cultivation; you do not find it among gross people."  And Aesop, who termed gratitude the sign of noble souls.

   THEY TELL US that all actions and urges are motivated by selfishness--love, kindness, generosity and bravery as well as greed, envy, hate, lust, ambition and cowardice.  Selfishness is the driving force.
   I suspect that this is true, but even though it be, I see no reason why this in any way tarnishes humanitarian actions, blights valor or makes a mockery of generosity.  If one makes a sacrifice for a friend, rival, benefactor or maiden aunt he should not stand condemned for experiencing an inner glow.  That is his
 reward, and one rightly earned.

C.M. Guthrie

   Anyway, when I do anyone a favor I expect him to show gratitude.  If he doesn't I feel deprived and outraged.  I may be petty and even doggish.  If so, I'm sure I have company.  The dog, I figure, is the recipient of good deeds who takes them for granted.
   You do not win friends unfailingly by doing favors.  Favors can bring resentment and an unwanted sense of obligation as well as gratitude.  As good a way as any to win a friend is to maneuver someone into doing a favor for you.
   But I refuse to downgrade gratitude.  I'm sure that Dick Kerr is grateful to Musial and that Musial appreciates the fact.  I agree with the New York Times, which said that while the St. Louis star declared that that 3000th hit gave him the greatest thrill of his life, he'd get an even bigger one when he visited the Kerrs in that home he gave them.


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