The Catcher Was a Spy

by Nicholas Dawidoff

  16 “Station chiefs, for”: Interview with William Hood, New York.

  17 “American intelligence began to”: Rhodes, p. 568.

  18 “In Washington, in 1952”: Thomas Powers, The Man Who Kept the Secrets, p. 68.

  19 “On February 5, 1950”: Berg FBI file.

  20 “It was eventually revealed”: Bertrand Goldschmidt, Atomic Rivals, p. 349; Alan Moorehead, The Traitors; and Pontecorvo’s obituary in the New York Times, September 28, 1993, were all useful in constructing this section.

  21 “Berg was given a fat”: CIA anonymous sources who worked directly with him or who are familiar with Berg’s operations file. Much of this section of the text relies on interviews with past and present CIA employees who choose to remain anonymous. This is the case with all further CIA material in the text, unless otherwise noted. Also, Edoardo Amaldi told Thomas Powers about Berg and Pontecorvo.

  22 “to interview Anna Anderson”: Berg told June McElroy, among others, this story. Interview with June McElroy, Washington, D.C.

  23 “No one is to disturb”: Interview with Timothy Burke by telephone.

  24 “For the maid”: Kaufman, p. 243. 244. “The maid did not”: Interview with Timothy Burke by telephone.

  25 “He always wore”: Hirano, p. 183.

  26 “Timmy told her husband”: Interview with Timothy Burke by telephone.

  27 “He once explained to Sam”: Goudsmit to Irwin Berg. Interview with Irwin Berg, New York.

  28 “Berg told Ted Sanger”: Interview with Ted Sanger, Cambridge, Massachusetts.

  29 “Dulles was a big”: Interview with William Hood, New York.

  30 “A Berg who is”: Interview with Richard Helms, Washington, D.C.

  31 “The goal of the craft”: Interview with Charles McCarry by telephone.

  32 “Moe was an amateur”: Interview with Monroe Karasik, Chevy Chase, Maryland.

  33 “Every success he had”: Interview with Harry Broley, Washington D.C.

  34 “As always, fluid”: Berg notebook entry, December 1954.

  35 “It wouldn’t become me”: Berg to Russell Gray, November 1959.

  36 “Like George Orwell”: George Orwell, Down and Out in Paris and London, p. 20.

  37 “I do not know”: Dix to Earl Brodie. Interview with Earl Brodie, San Francisco.

  38 “Each time he went”: Interview with Duncan Robertson by telephone.

  39 “drop small hints”: Interview with Mariette Fay by telephone.

  40 “He was evasive”: Interview with Duncan Robertson by telephone.

  41 “he didn’t look Japanese”: Interview with Mariette Fay by telephone.

  42 “curve ball curves”: Interview with Duncan Robertson by telephone.

  43 “Princeton parties”: Interview with Arthur Wightman by telephone.

  44 “Pocket Books published”: Edward Weeks, editor, The Pocket Atlantic.

  45 “That was Kieran’s version”: Interview with Margaret Ford Kieran by telephone and correspondence.

  46 “Mr. Berg, you teach”: Ira Berkow (Newspaper Enterprise Association), Ann Arbor News, June 18, 1972.

  47 “After the Robertsons”: Interview with Jean Makrauer by telephone.

  48 “While he was sitting”: Interview with Richard Edie by telephone.

  49 “transcribed twenty-seven pages”: Berg notebook entry, November 7, 1958.

  50 “My God, Sam”: Sam Berg, December 12, 1978.

  51 “At one of them”: Interview with Robert Wallace by telephone and correspondence.

  52 “On Saturdays”: Interview with Harvey Yavener by telephone.

  53 “He’d appear and disappear”: Interview with Harvey Yavener by telephone.

  54 “Nobody knows”: Interview with Morrie Siegel by telephone.

  55 “already disappeared”: Interviews with Ted Berg, October 19, 1992; and with Virginia Berg, October 15, 1992, both by telephone.

  56 “When Berg telephoned”: Interview with I. M. Levitt, Philadelphia.

  57 “an oil deal”: Berg, undated 1954 notebook entry; interview with Horace Calvert by telephone.

  58 “stainless steel”: Berg notebook entry, October 1955.

  59 “according to his brother”: Sam Berg to Sam Goudsmit.

  60 “A few months after”: Interview with Earl Brodie, San Francisco.

  61 “H. P. Robertson was”: Interview with Mariette Fay by telephone.

  62 “a very smart man”: Interview with William Fowler by telephone.

  63 “through Antonio Ferri”: Interviews with Renata Ferri, Huntington, New York, and with W. R. Sears by telephone were helpful in constructing this section.

  64 “Budapest-born Von Karman”: Theodore Von Karman and Lee Edson, The Wind and Beyond, pp. 246–48.

  65 “Jewish bachelor”: Interview with Lee Arnold by telephone.

  66 “Japanese mispronunciations”: Interview with W. R. Sears by telephone; and W. R. Sears, undated letter to the Princeton Alumni Weekly, from Princeton University alumni files.

  67 “Von Karman’s brother”: Ethel Berg, p. 266; and interview with Lee Arnold by telephone.

  68 “Berg’s government employment form”: Morris Berg Office of Personnel Management file.

  69 “My new career”: Berg notebook entry, June 12, 1958.

  70 “The assignment”: Kaufman, p. 244, says that Berg was working with scientists and military personnel to decide NATO’s missile launching base sites. I think it unlikely that Berg had expertise in this area.

  71 “He nosed around Europe”: Berg AGARD notes, undated, from Powers’s Berg file.

  72 “In late June”: Ibid.

  73 “In Zurich”: Berg, undated notebook entry. 259. “Bastard—black marketeer”: Berg notebooks, July 1958.

  74 “Alice was at”: Berg notebooks, undated.

  75 “I was able to”: Berg notes to Dr. Von Karman.

  76 “sixty-three of them”: Berg notebook entries, August 5, 1958, and April 23, 1960.

  77 “I don’t know why”: Interview with Eugene Fubini by telephone.

  78 “Fidel Neroes”: Berg to Sam Goudsmit, undated.

  79 “Silverman never knew”: Interview with Arnold Silverman, Boston.

  80 “He talked about himself”: Interview with Dorrit Gloss, Boston.

  81 “as a small token”: George Gloss to Berg, April 26, 1965; Ethel Berg, p. 285.

  82 “He used my stand”: Interview with Larry Rosenthal, Boston.

  83 “thirteen-century French”: Interview with Ted Sanger, Cambridge, Massachusetts.

  84 “waiters at the Ritz”: Interview with Jean Makrauer by telephone.

  85 “Cronin was the”: Interview with Warren Berg, Boston.

  86 “At a coffee shop”: Interview with Richard Gurner by telephone.

  87 “I’ll do that”: Interview with Jean Makrauer by telephone.

  88 “Susie had an upsetting”: Interview with Susie Makrauer by telephone.

  89 “He’d give me”: Interview with Fred Makrauer by telephone.

  90 “It was at the Parker House”: This section is based on interviews with Marjory B. Sanger, Winter Park, Florida; Ted Sanger, Cambridge, Massachusetts; Harry Broley, Washington, D.C.; and Berg’s notebook entries on the subject.

  91 “pillar to post”: Interview with Ted Sanger, Cambridge, Massachusetts.

  92 “Ted and Marnie affair”: Berg notebook entry, May 1, 1959.

  93 “Moe had a kind of”: Interview with Harry Broley, Washington, D.C.

  94 “four or five days”: Interview with Harry Broley, Washington, D.C.; and Berg’s Arthur D. Little file.

  95 “Berg had been baseball”: Interview with Warren Berg, Boston.

  96 “confidential study”: Arthur D. Little documents, May 25, June 29, and July 18, 1962.

  97 “From May 30”: Berg’s report, dated June 5, 1962.

  98 “That was the only time”: John Kieran to Asa Bushnell, December 1, 1972.

  99 “Sunday News sports editor”: Correspondence with James Fre
edman.

  100 “When Hirano came”: Hirano, p. 115. 275. “Berg knew that”: Berg notebook entry, May 6, 1959.

  101 “Berg’s notebooks are”: Ibid., February 29, 1960.

  102 “When a lunch with”: Ibid., April 1960.

  103 “After the first day”: Ibid., May 6, 1959; and interview with Robert Wallace by telephone.

  104 “A man named Charlie”: Interview with Fred Armenti by telephone.

  105 “Penn Central conductor”: Bus Saidt to Ethel Berg; and Ethel Berg, p. 308.

  106 “Berg made himself”: Interview with Jerome Holtzman by telephone.

  107 “brushed past them”: Interview with Margaret Feldman by telephone and correspondence.

  108 “He missed it”: Interview with Harry Broley, Washington, D.C.

  109 “floating secret village”: Interview with Charles McCarry by telephone. McCarry now writes former CIA director Richard Helms’s favorite spy novels, the Paul Christopher thrillers.

  110 “Estella Huni told”: Interview with Paul Kahn, New York.

  111 “Nobody knew”: Interview with Murray Goodman by telephone.

  112 “Never let him near”: Interview with Jimmy Breslin, New York.

  113 “In the late 1950s”: Interview with Mary Hedges, in East Hampton, New York, and by telephone and correspondence.

  114 “Berg’s behavior was odd”: In the next room, recovering from an automobile accident, was the Dodgers catcher Roy Campanalla. Mary Adams says Berg never went in to say hello. Instead, he sat beside Caswell Adams.

  115 “His notebooks are full”: Berg notebooks, late 1950s and May 1960.

  116 “In 1963, June McElroy”: Interview with June McElroy, Washington, D.C., and correspondence.

  117 “He’s tickling me”: Ibid. Interview with Joseph Crowley, Washington, D.C.; interview with Alexandra Gelmi by telephone.

  118 “Clare Hall met”: Interview with Clare Hall Smith, Washington, D.C., and correspondence. 285. “Washington is a”: Ibid.

  119 “For some men”: Interview with Robert Furman, Washington, D.C.; interview with Thomas Powers, South Royalton, Vermont.

  120 “compartmentalizing his friends”: Interview with Clare Hall Smith, Washington, D.C.

  121 “He filled his notebooks”: Berg notebooks, entry for September 10, 1959, for example.

  122 “If it wasn’t for”: Interview with Harry Broley, New York.

  123 “In New York”: Groves to Berg, October 1959.

  124 “Through years of afternoons”: Interview with Harry Broley, Washington, D.C.; interview with Duke Zeibert, Washington, D.C.

  125 “One day at Duke’s”: Interview with Joseph Crowley, Washington, D.C.

  126 “William Klein’s first”: Interview with William and Helen Klein, New York.

  127 “One summer day”: Interview with Harry Broley, New York.

  128 “Discussing baseball with”: Interview with Fred Down by telephone.

  129 “sit by himself”: Interview with Jimmy Breslin, New York.

  130 “1956 old-timers game”: New York Times, August 26, 1956.

  131 “In 1963, Casey Stengel”: Berg’s “Notes for Mets,” May 28, 1963, courtesy Charles Owen.

  132 “The fact was that”: Interview with Harry Broley, Washington, D.C.

  133 “He was always”: Hy Goldberg, Newark Evening News, undated clipping from Berg file.

  134 “He was the only former ballplayer”: Interview with Roger Angell by telephone and correspondence.

  135 “You’d be at a”: Interview with Dave Anderson by telephone.

  136 “Just as often”: Jerome Holtzman, “A Great Companion,” Sporting News, June 24, 1972.

  137 “Sitting with Berg”: Interview with Seymour Siwoff by telephone.

  138 “You caught me”: Interview with Ira Berkow, New York.

  139 “After the game”: Interview with Ira Berkow, New York; interview with Harold Rosenthal by telephone.

  140 “Everyone knew”: Interview with Ernie Harwell by telephone.

  141 “When the stories were filed”: Holtzman, A Great Companion, p. 164.

  142 “Baseball executives”: Interview with Buzzy Bavasi by telephone.

  143 “stuff a couple of sandwiches”: Interview with Larry Merchant by telephone.

  144 “Men would check”: Interview with Larry Merchant by telephone; interview with Bob Broeg by telephone.

  145 “In the 1950s”: Interview with Harold Rosenthal by telephone.

  146 “A policeman would notice”: Interview with David Burgin by telephone.

  147 “He tried to get”: Interview with Murray Olderman by telephone.

  148 “ ‘Always remember,’ Grayson”: Interview with Ira Berkow, New York.

  149 “Grayson was a master”: Interviews with Jimmy Breslin, New York; and Shirley Povich, Washington, D.C.

  150 “Moe seemed the last”: Interview with Murray Olderman by telephone.

  151 “He never paid a bill”: Interview with Jimmy Breslin, New York.

  152 “He’d be talking”: Interview with Frank Slocum by telephone.

  153 “The scientists”: Interview with Jimmy Breslin, New York.

  154 “How’s the arm”: Interview with Jimmy Breslin, New York.

  155 “Fred didn’t want”: Interview with Nancy Corcoran by telephone.

  156 “Why don’t you spend”: Interview with Joe DiMaggio by telephone.

  157 “A pair of bachelors”: Interview with Arthur Richman by telephone.

  158 “Of all Berg hosts”: Information for this section comes from Jerome Holtzman’s article about Berg, “A Great Companion,” Sporting News, June 24, 1972, and several interviews with Holtzman by telephone.

  159 “the world’s greatest guest”: Interview with Lee MacPhail, Delray Beach, Florida.

  160 “coin shop”: David Shulman correspondence.

  161 “He was also always”: Interview with Lee Arnold by telephone.

  162 “He sent Nelson”: Rockefeller archives.

  163 “Berg was in Toots Shor’s”: Interview with Jimmy Breslin, New York.

  164 “In 1954, Rockefeller”: Berg notebooks, 1954; interview with Charles Owen, Washington, D.C.

  165 “Rockefeller’s secretaries”: April 27, 1966, memo to Nelson Rockefeller.

  166 “one of his assistants wrote”: letter, March 8, 1973, Rockefeller file.

  167 “Berg also made strenuous”: Interview with Henry Ringling North, Beguins, Switzerland.

  168 “Henry Hyde, whom Berg”: Interview with Henry Hyde, New York.

  169 “No summer went by”: Interview with Jimmy Breslin, New York.

  170 “By the sixth”: Interview with Jimmy Breslin, New York.

  171 “At the 1967 World Series”: The source for this section is an interview with Dr. Hardy Hendron, Boston.

  172 “The moon-faced Martland”: Samuel Berg, Harrison Stanford Martland.

  173 “In 1934, Dr. Sam”: Sam Berg’s résumé.

  174 “Dr. Sam would weep”: Interview with Barbara S. Irwin, Newark.

  175 “hero worship”: Interview with William Sharpe, New York. Further information about Sam Berg comes from interviews with William Greifinger by telephone; Charles Owen, Washington, D.C.; and Murray Strober, Nutley, New Jersey.

  176 “an army blood bank”: Sam Berg file; Berg, Harrison Stanford Martland; Guy Savino, “Disrupted Lives to Help War Effort” and “Fate Links Newarkers, Bomb,” Newark Evening News, December 7 and December 8, 1966; and interview with Earl Brodie, San Francisco.

  177 “You Book women”: Interview with Elizabeth Shames, Portland, Maine.

  178 “I was frightened”: Interview with Frances Book Kashdan by telephone.

  179 “For twenty-five years”: Interview with Charles Cummings, Newark.

  180 “Several months ago”: Sam Berg to Sam Goudsmit, December 4, 1951.

  181 “You’d think at first”: Interview with Charles Cummings, Newark.

  182 “As a young”: Interviews with Elsie Chmel
nik, Nettie Hafer, and William Greifinger by telephone.

  183 “it was almost”: Interview with Barbara S. Irwin, Newark.

  184 “Timely Medical Topics”: University of Medicine and Dentistry of New Jersey file.

  185 “That’s stupid”: Interview with Charles Cummings, Newark.

  186 “Wearing a rubber suit”: Interviews with Richard Evans, Margaret Jennings Gahan, Nettie Hafer, and John P. Healy by telephone.

  187 “Berg would sometimes spend”: Interview with Robert Cole by telephone.

  188 “I would rather be”: Sam Berg notes, December 31, 1978. See also G. O. Trevelyan, Life and Letters of Macaulay (London, 1876), vol. 1, pp. 203–4.

  189 “Terrified that he”: Sam Berg, “Recollections About Moe Jotted Down Now and Then,” undated.

  190 “A buck”: Ibid.

  191 “As children”: Sam Berg notes, March 10, 1979.

  192 “Berg was always pumping”: Sam Berg, “Recollections.”

  193 “Dr. Sam found”: Ibid.

  194 “Siamese cats”: Sam Berg notes, January 4, 1979.

  195 “At the first stop light”: Ibid., January 2, 1979.

  196 “When Dr. Sam went out”: Interviews with Elsie Chmelnik and Nettie Hafer by telephone.

  197 “Dr. Sam dated”: Interviews with Elsie Chmelnik and Nettie Hafer.

  198 “An exception was”: Sam Berg notes, March 10, 1979.

  199 “On days when he”: Sam Berg to Charles Owen, July 17, 1983.

  200 “In the living room”: Sam Berg, “Some Thoughts About Brother Moe,” a speech given at Princeton University, June 3, 1988.

  201 “tested for syphilis”: Sam Berg to Charles Owen, July 17, 1983.

  202 “He knew that”: Sam Berg, speech at Princeton University.

  203 “I was the favorite”: Sam Berg notes, January 4, 1979.

  204 “What the hell”: Ibid., May 14, 1989.

  205 “That sonnet”: Undated letter from Sam to Moe Berg. Courtesy of Irvin Berg.

  206 “She exulted in”: Sam Berg notes, January 2, 1979.

  207 “Observing this”: Ibid., March 2, 1979.

  208 “I would have married her”: Sam Berg to Sam Goudsmit, July 23, 1964.

  209 “She visited Dr. Sam”: Ibid.

  210 “After Berg’s death”: Sam Berg notes, December 31, 1978.