just too much bacon and beans

Oh, the eating was some of the best part of being on the road! We'd get all kinds of food depending on where we was playing--we got Cajun food in Louisiana, or we'd put together some money when we were in Maryland and split a lobster up.

The best meal I ever ate? I don't have to think twice 'bout it: this little chuck wagon by the train depot in Gasconade County, Missouri. Our train came a-rollin' in just before noon, and boy, were we hungry! Were we ever hungry!

This little old cowboy-lookin' fella is sittin' there sipping coffee out of his mug, and he's got us pegged from minute one: "You boys baseball players?"

Pete St. Dixon looks him over and says, "Yes, sir, but for now, we're just a couple of hungry dogs!" We all laughed and laughed!

The cowboy laughs, too, and he says, "You boys got a game against the local squad today, I hear--can't be playin' on an empty stomach now, can you?"

So the cowboy invites us over to his chuck wagon and just starts serving us some of the best food you could eat! We ate hubbard squash and custard pie and bacon and beans and corn dodgers and biscuits and salt pork and home fries 'n' onions and locoweed and Johnnycakes and prairie strawberries and squirrel pie and aged bear's paw and pea fruit stir.

Well, by the time we walked away from that meal, we were in no state to play a game of baseball! I'll never forget Lucky Young drinking some seltzer water at the hotel and lookin' like he was about to burst!

We went out there and lost 9-1. The only run we scored was when Tommy "Half-Hand" Shaw got hit by a pitch 'cause he was so bloated from that lunch, his gut hung out over the plate. He gets beaned in the paunch and eventually gets around the bases to get our only run. Collapsed the second he touched home!

Just too much bacon and beans, I'd say!