Mountain Views News, Combined Edition Saturday, June 18, 2022

OPINIONOPINION 1111 Mountain Views-News Saturday, June 18, 2022 OPINIONOPINION 1111 Mountain Views-News Saturday, June 18, 2022 
MOUNTAIN 

VIEWS 

NEWS 

PUBLISHER/ EDITOR

Susan Henderson 

PASADENA CITY 
EDITOR 

Dean Lee 

PRODUCTION 

SALES 

Patricia Colonello 
626-355-2737 
626-818-2698 

WEBMASTER 

John Aveny 

DISTRIBUTION 

Peter Lamendola 

CONTRIBUTORS 

Stuart Tolchin 
Audrey SwansonMeghan MalooleyMary Lou CaldwellKevin McGuire 
Chris Leclerc 
Bob Eklund 
Howard HaysPaul CarpenterKim Clymer-KelleyChristopher NyergesPeter Dills 
Rich Johnson 
Lori Ann Harris 
Rev. James SnyderKatie HopkinsDeanne Davis 
Despina ArouzmanJeff Brown 
Marc Garlett 
Keely TotenDan Golden 
Rebecca WrightHail Hamilton 
Joan Schmidt 
LaQuetta Shamblee 

Mountain Views News 
has been adjudicated asa newspaper of GeneralCirculation for the County 
of Los Angeles in CourtCase number GS004724: 
for the City of SierraMadre; in Court CaseGS005940 and for the 
City of Monrovia in CourtCase No. GS006989 and 
is published every Saturday 
at 80 W. Sierra MadreBlvd., No. 327, Sierra 
Madre, California, 91024.
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A member 
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Mountain Views News 

Mission Statement 

The traditions of 

community news


papers and the 

concerns of our readers 


are this newspaper’s 
top priorities. We 
support a prosperous

community of well-
informed citizens. We 


hold in high regard the 

valuesoftheexceptional

quality of life in our 

community, includingthe magnificence of 
our natural resources. 


Integrity will be our guide. 

JOE Guzzardi 
REMEMBERING A PERFECT 


GAME ON FATHER’S DAY 

On Father’s Day, 1964, Philadelphia Phillies’ right-hander Jim 
Bunning pitched a perfect game against the New York Mets in 
Shea Stadium. 

Bunning’s two-hour, 10-minute masterpiece – 90 pitches, 10 
strike outs – during a double-header’s first game had special 
significance. At the time, Bunning and his wife, Mary Theis,
had seven children. Eventually, the Bunnings, married 60 
years, would have nine children, 35 grandchildren and seven 
great-grandchildren. 
Few in baseball history have lived as rewarding a life as Bunning, 
who represented Kentucky as a U.S. representative from 1987 to 1999, and then as 
a two-term U.S. senator from 1999 until 2011. Bunning’s baseball achievements put him 
in the Hall of Fame. Along the way, Bunning racked up 224 wins, 2,855 strike outs and 
was chosen to participate in nine All-Star Games. The fire-balling righty led the leaguein strike outs three times, and when he retired Bunning ranked second among all-time 
strikeout leaders behind Walter Johnson of the Washington Senators. 

In 1955, Bunning debuted with the Detroit Tigers, and in 1958, he threw a 3-0 no-hitter 
against the Boston Red Sox. Bunning was then traded to the Phillies, his second stop in 
a career that also included brief stints with the Pittsburgh Pirates and the Los Angeles 
Dodgers. 

Long after Bunning hung up his glove, he recalled in detail how he set down 27 consecutive 
Mets, the first National League perfect game since 1880. After attending Mass at St. 
Patrick’s Cathedral, and eating a hearty sausage and egg breakfast, Bunning headed out to 
Shea Stadium, where the temperature and humidity would hit 90 by game time.
Although Bunning said that he felt no better or no worse than usual as he warmed up, 
Phillies’ manager Gene Mauch disagreed. Mauch told Sport Magazine’s Larry Merchant, 
“We knew when he [Bunning] was warming up that this was something special. The wayhe was throwing so live and as high as he was. Not high with his pitches. High himself.” 

For nine innings, Bunning was so relaxed that he rejected the long-standing baseball tradition 
which forbade pitchers to talk to teammates about no hitters in progress – considered 
a jinx. “Dive for the ball,” Bun-ning laughingly told his infielders. “Don’t let anythingfall in.” 

With one out in the bottom of the ninth, Bunning called catcher Gus Tri-andos to the 
mound and asked him to tell him a joke. Triandos shook his head in dismay and went 
back behind the plate. Bunning then struck out the last two Mets and pounded his glove 
as his teammates rushed to share his joy in his 6-0 win. 

Bunning’s was the fifth perfect game in major-league history and the first in the regular 
season since the Chicago White Sox Charlie Robertson blanked the Detroit Tigers, 2-0.
Later, Bunning said about his flawless performance: “Everything has to come together, 
good control, outstanding plays from your teammates, a whole lot of good fortune on 
your side and a lot of bad luck for the other guys. A million things could go wrong, but on 
this one particular day of your life none of them do.” 

But when Bunning looked back at his 1964 season, disappointment super-seded his perfect 
game’s thrills. By September 20, the Phillies led by 6½-games with 12 to play. But 
then the wheels fell off. The Phils lost ten in a row; Bunning, overworked by Mauch, was 
charged with three losses. The St. Louis Cardinals eked out the pennant by a game over 
the Phils and the Cincinnati Reds. 
Before he died at age 85, Bunning said, “I am most proud of the fact I went through nearly11 years without missing a start. They wrote my name down, and I went to the post.” 
In today’s era, Bunning’s consistency would be a marvel.

Joe Guzzardi is a Progressives for Immigration Reform analyst who has written about immigration for more 
than 30 years. Contact him at jguzzardi@pfirdc.org. 

STUART TOLCHIN 
PUT THE LIGHTS ON 


READING 

During the first week that I lived in Sierra Madre with my children 
we would drive to Santa Anita on weekends. First we would watch 
the horses being saddled and then watch them walking to the track 
while we looked at our programs. My eight year old daughter became 
a statistical whiz and enjoyed reading, or trying to read, as 
we looked at our programs and tried to pick a winner. At the last 
moment we would race to the window and make our small bets. 
This was 1979 and my daughter was 6 or 7. 

I like to think that this weekend exercise helped my daughter to become the person 
she is. She learned the value of study and she learned to enjoy numbers. She learned that 
sometimes you won and sometimes you lost but the most important thing was to do your 
best. My daughter now is a very hard working mother of an almost three year old and is verybusy being a mother and running her immigration practice. On Monday my son and I were 
given directions to purchase food which we could eat together in my daughter’s office before 
we walked together to my granddaughter’s first ballet lesson with the older kids, the three 
year olds. During the time my son and I shopped my daughter hurriedly prepared some legal 
papers which had to be filed in the morning. I wished I could be of more help. 

Yesterday, I called to just see how she was doing and she had some good news. She 
had been working on this one case pro bono (that means without receiving any money) for 
about four years putting in about one hundred fifty hours. Earlier on Tuesday she received 
the news that the Biden administration had loosened a terrorism-related related exemption 
that would arguably allow her client to return to the United States and rejoin his family and 
resume his life. It’s true the facts are complicated and I really don’t understand very much 
but in connection with the Presidential action my daughter was interviewed by the Los Angeles 
Times and that interview would be described in today’s LA Times. Hooray; I could 
hardly wait for the morning to go to Happy’s Liquor Store to buy a paper.

 At eight o’clock there were only a few papers on the stand. I was going to buy a number 
of papers and place the page with her interview on the wall. First I thought it best to find 
out the price of an individual daily paper. To my surprise the cost was over four dollars, the 
same price as the Sunday paper. I couldn’t believe it and asked the man behind the counter 
for an explanation. He explained to me that hardly anybody ever reads the paper anymore as 
everyone got their news from Social Media or television. As I looked through the thin paper 
and found the interview with my daughter on page four my elation diminished. The article 
containing the news about my daughter was exciting and quoted her as saying “I’m going 
to cry”, she said, “this is morally right and politically right”. Still, as I looked at the paper, I 
felt like I had lost an old friend. The paper was so small and did not even contain a separate 
Sports Section. 

I was an early reader as my immigrant grandmother and I learned to read English 
together before I went to Elementary School. Being comfortable with reading helped me in 
School and over the years has helped to shape my ideals which I believe have had some influence 
upon the development of my daughter and the socially responsible life she leads. Later 
in life I would read the paper aloud to my father who had lost his vision and we would talk 
about it. Today more than sixty years later, my two year old, almost three year old granddaughter 
can now play a game in which I pick out a scrabble piece and she looks at it, thinks 
for a while and names the letter. I ask her to name a word that starts with that letter and she 
generally produces a correct word. She likes to orally pronounce the letters on license plates 
and my wife told me that a couple of people attempted to give her a five dollar bill in appreciation 
of her ability. My wife didn’t want to accept the money but the people said to “keep 
the bill for her college fund”. 

College is a long way off but for now I am displaying the bill on my dresser next to an 
article written by my father eighty years ago during the depression. There is a connection 
between the willingness and the ability to read, write and reflect. It is perhaps a necessary 
part of a responsible and caring life. It’s hard to explain but I hope you and my granddaughter 
after I am gone will understand that I was doing my best to point her in what I think to be 
the right direction. 

Maybe all I am saying is that it is better to pick up a book rather than a gun, or a video game 
and one person, or a whole society, will be rewarded for that decision. 


RICH & FAMOUS 

FATHER’S 
DAY 
2022 


Well, at last count there are, hmmm, 4 or 5 achievements 
of significance I have attained in my years on this planet. 
Achievements defined as accomplishments one takes pride 
in. 

Without a doubt my two greatest achievements were 
the successful co-creation of two wonderful kids, Alex 

(33) and Olivia (31). Let there be no misunderstanding: 
every positive trait they exhibit, they inherited from their 
mother, Helen. Particularly fortunate for them, my kids 
inherited her classic good looks. 
I am supremely happy with who my children have turned 
out to be. 

Comedienne Rita Rudner offered up what is probably the 
best present you can buy for your father for Father’s Day(paraphrased): Give him $100 and tell DAD to go out and 
buy a present for your MOM!. 

If you are lucky enough to be a father, cherish your 
children. If you have no children, rent some. There are 
plenty of children who could benefit from your friendship. 
Become a Big Brother. Whatever it takes. 

Tell your children how much you love them… often. If they 
want something from you, try to say YES more often than 
you say NO (especially when your NO is motivated merelyby a desire to not be inconvenienced at the moment). Also, 
if you say YES often enough, you will really shake up your 
kids and get their attention so when you do say NO, “NO” 
will mean something to them. 

Someone once said, “Why are men reluctant to become 
fathers? Because they aren’t through being children.” That 
statement jives with my personal experience. You can 
understand my belief that being a father and a child is not 
mutually exclusive. Be a father when there is fatherin’ to do. 
Be a child as often as you can the rest of the time. I do miss 
getting up on Saturday morning and watching “Teenage 
Mutant Ninja Turtle” Cartoons with my youngin’s. 

Celebrated college coach Jimmy Valvano said something 
about fatherhood I hope my kids might say about me: “Myfather gave me the greatest gift anyone could give another 
person: he believed in me.” 

So, to my kids: I love you Alex and Olivia… and Brooke. 
(Alex’s wonderful girlfriend and also MY daughter!) 

P.S. Fathers of Daughters: Do you and your wife a great 
favor. Carve out a lot of extra time for just DAD and 
daughter. Movies, parks, shopping…the more time you 
spend with your “little girl” the better choices she’ll make 
in her future relationships with guys. 
Have a wonderful Father’s Day! (Remember, gifts go to 
MOM lol!) 

Mountain Views News 80 W Sierra Madre Blvd. No. 327 Sierra Madre, Ca. 91024 Office: 626.355.2737 Fax: 626.609.3285 
Email: editor@mtnviewsnews.com Website: www.mtnviewsnews.com