Schoolboy Rowe and Edna

With his southern charm and eccentricities, Schoolboy Rowe became a fan favorite in Detroit. He was known as a superstitious player who carried amulets, talismans, and charms in his pockets, always picked up his glove with his left hand and even talked to the ball.


Rowe was loved particularly by female fans for his good looks and public devotion to his high-school sweetheart, Edna Mary Skinner. During a September 13, 1934, nationally broadcast interview on the Eddie Cantor radio show, Rowe asked his fiancee, "How'm I doing, Edna honey?" The line became famous, as Cantor recycled the line over and over on his broadcasts. The incident endeared Schoolboy to women across the country, but led to relentless heckling from fans and opposing players, who enjoyed taunting him with his own words: "How'm I doing, Edna?"

During his 16-game win streak in 1934, a reporter asked him for his secret, and Schoolboy responded that he would "just eat a lot of vittles, climb on that mound, wrap my fingers around the ball and say to it, 'Edna, honey, let's go.'"

Prior to the 1934 World Series, the Detroit News brought Edna to Detroit to write about baseball, Schoolboy, cooking or whatever she pleased. Pictures of Edna and Schoolboy or Edna posing with Babe Ruth were published in the newspapers, as the nation became caught up in the courtship of Schoolboy and Edna. The couple married shortly after the 1934 World Series.