"A circus, ain't it?" grinned Umpire Jocko Conlan as he looked over the Brooklyn Dodgers' training camp at Vero Beach, Fla. Some observers disagreed: it reminded them more of Willow Run or an Army basic training center. Whatever the word for Vero Beach, Dodger Boss Branch Rickey, the foxy grandpa of baseball, had brought mass production to spring baseball training.
Where the average big league club had taken a few score ballplayers to camp this month, Rickey had assembled more than 200—from Dodger Captain Pee Wee Reese down to raw bushers* trying to make...
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