Tom Stevens, the grandson of baseball legend Babe Ruth, first made his way to Hot Springs in 2018 when the city opened the Historic Baseball Trial. He returned on Monday to witness the unveiling of a bronze statue in his grandfather's honor.
Stevens is the grandson of George Hermon Ruth Jr. by way of Ruth's second wife, Claire Ruth. The late Julia Ruth Stevens, Tom Stevens' mother, was the adopted daughter of Babe Ruth.
"I spoke here in April 2018," Stevens said. "Hot Springs is wonderful. We like this place very much. We did not know what to expect back in 2018. Everybody is so friendly, outreaching kind of town."
Babe Ruth had two daughters, Julia and Dorothy.
Video not playing? Click here https://www.youtube.com/embed/tWjCIOP_hRM
"We have gotten to know the people at The Ohio Club," Stevens said. "Matter of fact, I sang with them the last time I was there."
Stevens is a civil engineer by trade and has traveled the world doing projects.
"I designed and built bridges," Stevens said. "One of the things I wanted to bring up is how Babe has not had a uniform on in over 85 years. He is still very relevant to baseball. I was very surprised to find that when I did a lot of work overseas and I would run into people from South Africa they know all about Babe."
In his travels to Thailand, he saw pictures of Babe Ruth in Bangkok restaurants and a country club.
"They do not give a fig as my mother would say about baseball in South Africa," Stevens said. "They care about cricket and rugby. The cricket tie-in is the greatest batsman of all time is an Australian by the name of Sir Don Bradman. Queen Elizabeth even knighted him and in Australia he is known as the Babe Ruth of cricket."
Stevens joked that he was a better softball player than a baseball player.
"I had a pretty good glove," Stevens said. "I did not have enough contact. I drove it pretty well when I hit it. I just did not hit it that often."
Now the burning question: Yankees or Red Sox?
"Yes!" Stevens said. "That is my answer. I grew up in New England so that is Red Sox nation. Of course, with my affiliation, I have to be a Yankees fan, too. It is kind of like when Brady left the Patriots, everybody rooted for the Buccaneers until they played the Patriots. Basically, what I tell sports writers is that I enjoy the game."
Stevens has mainly photos and a few autographs to remember the Babe, as most of his memorabilia were donated to the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum after his passing.
"One thing that Babe did was in his estate," Stevens said. "His will donated most of his memorabilia. It went to the Hall of Fame and they have so much they could not put it all out. So, unfortunately, the bats and the uniforms are all somewhere else."
On Monday, Babe Ruth's birthday and the 100 anniversary of Yankee Stadium, Majestic Park unveiled just the third bronze statue ever erected of Ruth.
"It is a real honor," Stevens said. "I speak to that because until 1995 there were no statues of him anywhere. Frank Robinson has three statues. I think it should be the same for Babe."
Stevens was on "Person to Person," a show with Edward Murrow in the 1950s and began to understand how great Babe's legacy was.
"I think I was about 6 years old when it started to dawn on me how important the Babe was," Stevens said. "The reason for that was, we were on TV and that was in the 1950s. There was not really much content on TV back then. It was a pretty big deal to be on television."
Although he never met his grandfather, Stevens grew up listening to the stories of the "The Great Bambino."
"I know that Babe did not tend to bring the game home with him," Stevens said. "He left it at the ballpark. My mother talked about all the fun things that they used to do together. He taught her how to bowl and tried to teach her golf, but that did not work out so well. They liked to go to New York Rangers games and, of course, back then before television they used to listen to these syndicated serialized broadcasts of the 'Lone Ranger' and the 'Green Hornet.' He took my mother hunting and fishing; he was a real outdoorsman."
When Babe Ruth was not smashing home runs he was driving balls at the golf course.
"He was about an eight handicap," Stevens said. "He and Ty Cob were rivals to a great extent. When they buried the hatchet they had a series of charity golf tournaments all over New England."
Everyone remembers Babe Ruth for home runs, but he was best known in the early parts of his career as a left-handed pitcher.
"He threw pretty hard," Stevens said. "I do not know if he was in the category of Walter Johnson as far as speed goes. He had a real good curve and a good change-up."
When Babe first came to Hot Springs he was sent to refine his pitching, but a 573-foot home run into the nearby Alligator Farm changed the course of his career.
"The interesting thing about that home run was it was fairly early in his career," Stevens said. "He was still thought of as a pitcher. That is what he was here for. He loved Hot Springs; he thrived here. You can see that in the seasons that he had. No one directed him to develop the swing that he had. No one thought anyone could hit a baseball that far so he did it twice."
In 1920, Babe Ruth hit a 500-foot home run in every ballpark he played in.
With a deep understanding of math and physics that Stevens possesses from being an engineer, Babe's power and swing are still at the forefront of understanding.
"When they study Babe's swing and put the physics to it and everything it turns out the things he instinctively did are what they would teach players today if they want to hit the long ball," Stevens said. "Somehow Babe's power was just beyond anything any ballplayer has today. Many of the guys we look at as the sluggers today like Bryce Harper and Aaron Judge there (are) no 500-foot home runs."
Babe Ruth was awarded the Presidential Medal of Freedom by Donald Trump in 2018, the nation's highest civilian honor. Stevens accepted the Medal for the Ruth family.
"It was quite an honor," Stevens said.
"My only question was, what took so long? There were lots of ballplayers who received that award and deservedly so. Why did it take so long to recognize the Babe.
"There was this one story, my mother's graduation trip from high school. They went to Japan in 1934 and it was one of the highlights of her life. A Japanese fellow came to the door asking for an autograph. He was wearing a kimono and handed Babe the ball, he signed it. Then he handed him another ball and dropped the other in the sleeve of his Komono. My mother said he must have done this 20 times and Babe signed them all."
A story that Stevens remembers hearing about his grandfather that always showed the Babe's larger-than-life personality was the Billy Werber story.
"The oldest living major leaguer that played with Babe was Werber," Stevens said. "He joined the Yankees in the '30s in the twilight of Babe's career. He came in as a rookie and was a speedster. He was the leadoff hitter and got on base. Babe always hit third in the order before Lou Gehrig. Babe drove one out and Werber wanted to show off his speed. He took off around the base path. He was at home plate waiting to shake hands with Babe when he came in on his home run trot. Werber was a little guy and Babe patted him on the head and said, 'You do not have to run like that when the Babe hits the ball.'"