Here's a cool article:

http://imprimis.hillsdale.edu/who-was-ty......s-wrong/

But the reason I'm posting it is this: "everybody knows" is surprisingly spongy. Everybody knows: Islam, transexuality, Donald Trump, law, medicine, history, magic, whatever. The old Socratic "know that you don't know" is in short supply.

Great article, thanks Jeff.

It's interesting to me that the article attributes at least some of the general misinformation to the Ken Burns series.

When I interviewed Burns about Jackie Robinson, I specifically asked, "It's been said that more Americans get their history from Ken Burns than any other source--does that responsibility weigh on you?"

And Burns, who I think is an amazing documentarian, nevertheless, was to me, much too confident in his answer--he said he had researchers, not really worried, etc., etc.

But the truth is that the truth about our past is sometimes surprisingly hard to track down once the first-person sources are gone.

I lost interest in Ken Burns when he did his Jazz series, in which Winton Marsalis was portrayed in the same light as Ellington, Armstrong, etc.

Hard to believe writers such as Stump could so intentionally and freely decide to take part in ruining a person's reputation.

Well (sadly), not hard to believe...it is just rather depressing to see such a despicable example of someone who has done just that.

That was an excellent article, even for those of us who have never heard of Cobb. It raises some questions on journalistic ethics. Cobb sounds like one of the good guys.

Interesting article, however I had no idea Ty Cobbs had the reputation described in it.

I picked up Leerhsen's book on Cobb a while back based on reviews and the fact that he set the record straight. This guy was one smart ball player. A lot of people don't know he had stock in both General Motors and Coca Cola. He was worth several million dollars and quite charitable.

I'm not a baseball guy, don't follow the game, but knew of Ty Cobb and "knew" of his horrible reputation. That was all I knew, that he was one of the greats, and that he was a really bad guy. Pity about that, but glad that the record is getting set aright.

I enjoyed the article which contradicts what is called 'populist epistemology' ("everybody knows"). But the article is also good for striking against 'agnosticism' ("nobody knows"). I really liked how the author looked into old newspapers from 1911 to fid the sources of stories! There is even new scholarship coming out about the US Civil War !!!. A couple of good books: "1861" by Adam Goodheart and "The Half Has Never Been Told" by Edward Baptist. Both books draw not only on historian's accounts, but on first person accounts and evidence of historical fact. A scientific approach! Lynn

The winners write the history and the dead are the losers.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SL1KbQU30-4