1978 Play-by-Play

January

January 2nd, scoring opened early as two Basals (J. and N.) and two Perrimans (Jr. and Sr.) scored five on Gov. Cyril King. (The Register also listed King, but their list was postmarked after he was already dead; their whining was piteous, but pointless.)... Jan. 6th, J. Corrigan and D. Perriman Jr. scored two on millionaire John McArthur and Perriman took the early lead at seven points... Jan. 13th, seven gamesters including both Basals, Chapter E, S. Greenstein, D. Perry and L. Smith tallied one on baseball's Joe McCarthy. Going Wild for five were Smith & Smith (no relation to L. Smith). And moving to within one point of the lead, J. Basal at six. Same day, 61 gamesters scored on four-pointer Hubert H. Humphrey, including the leader, D. Perriman Jr., now at 11 points and J. Basal at 10. Everyone who tagged McCarthy, with the exception of Smith & Smith, picked up the Daily Double. Eleven gamesters went Wild, including The Last Roundup and SLY, and Daily Doublers Chapter E and L. Smith, who were having quite a day... Jan. 18th, six scored five on TV actor Carl Betz, including S. Greenstein who moved to 10 points and a second place tie with J. Basal. Same day, S. Price soloed for two on actress Charlotte Greenwood... Jan. 20th, The Artful Dodger soloed for three on Gilbert Highet... Jan. 23rd, J. Batterson soloed for three on actor Jack Oakie... Jan. 27th, Ghostwriter scored his first Wild Card Solo on actor Oscar Homolka... Jan. 29th, J. Batterson was back with another solo, for two points on actor Tim McCoy.

February '78

February 9th, 12 gamesters scored on three-pointer and Nazi bad guy Herbert Kappler. D. Perriman Jr. was there, but J. Basal had listed Kappler as his Wild Card and the lead changed hands, with Basal on top 15-14... Feb. 15th, Smith & Smith continued their stylish ways with a three-point solo on Ilka Chase.

March '78

March 18th, F. Forward and C. Tremper tallied two each on actress Peggy Wood... Mar. 19th, J. Batterson was back for another solo, this one on Faith Baldwin for two points... Same day, The Last Roundup soloed for three on psychologist Oscar Buros... And on Mar. 22nd, N. Basal scored a beautiful three-point solo on Karl Wallenda, plunging from the high wire over the streets of San Juan, Puerto Rico. It was her fifth hit, which gave her the 1978 Silver Bobcat crown as the first to register a QPA, and she took the lead at 16 points!

April '78

April 8th, P. & E. Hepner and R. Terracotta (then playing out of Africa) covered the bag for two on baseball executive Ford Frick... Apr. 21st, 17 gamesters tallied three on actor Will Geer; among them, P. Marsch still smarting from his close solo call on a botched assassination of Larry Flynt... Apr. 27th, a young rookie Dr. Doornail showed the style he would become famous for, tallying a solo four points on Afghanistan's President Muhammed Daoud dying in a coup.

May '78

May 1st, B. Hamilton tabbed Sylvia Townsend Warner for two... May 14th, Kenya's R. Terracotta soloed for two on Australian statesman Robert Gordon Menzies and M. Stark soloed for two on opera's Aleksandr Kipnes... May 23rd, Binky Brown, J. Smoke, T. Curran and the four-year-old "let it ride" list of J. C. Hoffmeier all scored five on Joe Columbo... May 26th, M. Stark was back with a one-point solo on ballet idol Tamara Karsavina.

July '78

July 7th, after a longish lull, Chapter E and N. Percia tallied one point each on TV commercial spokesfeline Morris the Cat... July 10th, N. Percia and P. Percia each got a stingy three points from John D. Rockefeller III.

August '78

August 3rd, the pent up thunder began to roll. Twenty-six gamesters scored six on comic Totie Fields, but N. Basal, whose wafer-thin one-point lead had held since March 22nd, wasn't among them. The new leader was J. Basal at 21 points, with D. Perriman Jr. right behind him at 20... Aug. 4th, M. Stark soloed again, this time on Russian literary figure Lila Brik for two... Aug. 5th, TV comic Frank Fontaine gifted 10 gamesters with five points each, and D. Perriman Jr. was there, moving to 25 points, to wrest away the lead that J. Basal had held for two days... Aug. 6th, M. Stark was back for her fourth (!) solo, a three-pointer on architect Edward Durrell Stone. Same day, 44 gamesters gathered in Vatican City for a deuce on Pope Paul. Leading the way, with his third hit in four days, D. Perriman Jr. at 27 points... Aug. 14th, Igor and T. Beasom tallied three each on the Grand Old Man of the Jazz Violin, Joe Venuti... Aug. 22nd, five gamesters tallied two on Jomo Kenyatta... Aug. 24th, seven gamesters, led by the rampaging D. Perriman Jr., tallied four on singer Louis Prima, and Perriman rose to 31 points, with his closest competitors, J. Basal and Ghostwriter (?!) at 23... Aug. 26th, four gamesters scored three on actor Charles Boyer... And the month closed on the 28th with a three-point solo for Mullen's Revenge on historian Bruce Catton.

September '78

September 6th, J. Basal and N. Basal sat down for a snack at the Shanghai Restaurant in Dusseldorf's red light district, and got up with eight points each on terrorist Willy Peter Stoll, a mainstay on West Germany's "Most Wanted" list, rendered sieve-like by the local authorities. The eight points lifted J. Basal right up to 31 points and sudden tie with D. Perriman Jr. for the lead... Same day, Miss Sally and Ghostwriter scored seven points each on Who drummer Keith Moon, dying of an overdose in the same hotel suite where Cass Elliott died of a heart attack four years earlier. The seven lifted Ghostwriter to 30 points, right behind the leaders... Sept. 9th, D. Beach scored a stylish solo for two points on the movies' Jack Warner... Sept. 16th, the earth moved in Iran and three gamesters tallied ten big ones: B. Carrigan, W. Dockum and P. Marsch, the latter jumping from 20 to 30 points and into the fray at the top... Sept. 30th, six gamesters scored three on Charlie McCarthy's straight man, Edgar Bergen.

October '78

October 20th, S. Silino hit an amazing solo on actor Gig Young, in the Game's first murder/suicide, for four points... Oct. 21st, R. Terracotta tallied a solo two on Anastas Mikoyan... Oct. 23rd, Mr. Goodvibes, W. Krug and e. mcgrath serenaded Mother Maybelle Carter for four points... Oct. 24th, Floods/India went over the top for The Register and The National Health. And still J. Basal and D. Perriman Jr. were locked at 31, with Ghostwriter and P. Marsch at 30.

November '78

November 7th, D. Trageser scored a nice two-point solo on writer Janet Flanner... Nov. 8th, boxer Gene Tunny went down and six gamesters counted to two... Nov. 9th, illustrator Norman Rockwell drew a crowd of 23 gamesters for two points, including D. Perriman Jr. moving to 33 points and the lead!... Six days later, Nov. 15th, 21 gamesters tallied three on anthropologist Margaret Mead and leading the way was P. Marsch, surging to 33 and tying D. Perriman Jr.!

December '78

December 8th, double trouble. Twenty-eight tallied two on Israel's Golda Meir and two scored two on jeweler Harry Winston. Picking up Meir and Winston for a Daily Double was L. Conant. Using the Meir deuce, N. Basal and B. Carrigan rose to 31, both making a late run at the leaders... Dec. 10th, C. Tremper soloed on author and LBJ sibling Sam Houston Johnson for four points... Dec. 13th, Mullen's Revenge was awarded three points for conductor William Steinberg (who had died on May 16th)... Dec. 15th, J. C. Hoffmeier and W. Krug picked up three nice ones each for actor Chill Wills... Dec. 27th, B. Beasom, Game Sgt.-at-Arms, tallied a nice five-point solo on Algerian leader Hoari Boumediene... Dec. 31st, the numbers decreed that B. Beasom, Kane and D. McCarthy receive ten points for War/Rhodesia and R. Dunie pick up ten for War/Cambodia. Beasom's 15 points in four days doubled his score and vaulted him to 30, a Last Moment Lat Spread that left scores of gamesters in his shadow.

But no one could touch the leaders in the final days, and so it ended, with D. Perriman Jr. and P. Marsch tied at 33, and J. Basal (31), N. Basal (31), B. Carrigan (31), B. Beasom (30) and Ghostwriter (30) tantalizingly close, but smoking no cigars.

Let's look at the Top Ten for 1978.

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