As part of every Reds game broadcast on the Reds Radio Network, Greg Rhodes, noted baseball historian and director of the Reds Hall of Fame and Museum, presents a brief, colorful account of a memorable moment in the history of America's longest-running baseball team. These pieces have become a favorite feature for Reds fans, who love to celebrate the Big Red Machine's long and storied history and traditions. This collection brings together every single one of Rhodes' pieces in a single book for both Reds fans and baseball aficionados. Cincinnati Reds Hall of Fame Highlights chronicles more than 130 years of history and five world series championships and includes over 300 short accounts of the team's greatest, saddest, wildest, and weirdest players and moments. Packed with over 100 photos furnished by the Reds and their museum, the book pays tribute to a team that remains one of America's favorites.

The Big Red Machine dominated major league baseball in the 1970s, but the Cincinnati franchise began its climb to that pinnacle in 1961, when an unlikely collection of cast-offs and wannabes stunned the baseball world by winning the National League pennant. Led by revered manager Fred Hutchinson, the team featured rising stars like Frank Robinson, Jim O'Toole, and Vada Pinson, fading stars like Gus Bell and Wally Post, and a few castoffs who suddenly came into their own, like Gene Freese and 20-game-winner Joey Jay. In time to celebrate the 50th anniversary of their pennant-winning season, the amazing story of the "Ragamuffin Reds" is told from start to finish in Before the Machine. Written by long-time Reds Report editor Mark J. Schmetzer and featuring dozens of photos by award-winning photographer Jerry Klumpe of the Cincinnati Post & Times Star, this book surely will be a winner with every fan in Reds country and coincides with an anniversary exhibit at the Cincinnati Reds Hall of Fame and Museum. Through interviews and research, Before the Machine captures the excitement of a pennant race for a team that had suffered losing seasons in 14 of the past 16 years. Schmetzer also beautifully evokes the time and place--a muggy Midwestern summer during which, as the new song of the season boasts, "the whole town's batty for that team in Cincinnati." Led by regional talk-show star Ruth Lyons (the Midwest's "Oprah") fans rallied around the Reds as never before. The year didn't begin well for the team. Budding superstar Frank Robinson was arrested right before spring training for carrying a concealed weapon, and long-time owner Powel Crosley Jr., died suddenly just days before the start of the season. Few experts--or fans--gave the Reds much of a chance at first place anyway. With powerhouse teams in Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Milwaukee, the National League pennant was unlikely to fly over Cincinnati's Crosley Field. But manager Hutchinson somehow galvanized his motley crew and led them to victory after victory. Joey Jay, who had languished with the Braves, mowed down hitters while his rotation mates O'Toole and knuckleballer Bob Purkey did the same. The team also featured a dynamic duo in the bullpen in Bill Henry and Jim Brosnan, whose book about the season, Pennant Race, became a national bestseller the following year. As the rest of the league kept waiting for the Reds to fade, Hutch's boys kept winning--and finally grabbed the pennant. Though they couldn't continue their magic in the World Series against the Yankees, the previously moribund Reds franchise did continue to their success throughout the decade, winning 98 games in 1962 and falling just short of another pennant in 1964. They established a recipe for success that would lead, a few years later, to the emergence of the Big Red Machine.

The Big Red Machine dominated major league baseball in the 1970s, but the Cincinnati franchise began its climb to that pinnacle in 1961, when an unlikely collection of cast-offs and wannabes stunned the baseball world by winning the National League pennant. Led by revered manager Fred Hutchinson, the team featured rising stars like Frank Robinson, Jim O'Toole, and Vada Pinson, fading stars like Gus Bell and Wally Post, and a few castoffs who suddenly came into their own, like Gene Freese and 20-game-winner Joey Jay. In time to celebrate the 50th anniversary of their pennant-winning season, the amazing story of the "Ragamuffin Reds" is told from start to finish in Before the Machine. Written by long-time Reds Report editor Mark J. Schmetzer and featuring dozens of photos by award-winning photographer Jerry Klumpe of the Cincinnati Post & Times Star, this book surely will be a winner with every fan in Reds country and coincides with an anniversary exhibit at the Cincinnati Reds Hall of Fame and Museum. Through interviews and research, Before the Machine captures the excitement of a pennant race for a team that had suffered losing seasons in 14 of the past 16 years. Schmetzer also beautifully evokes the time and place--a muggy Midwestern summer during which, as the new song of the season boasts, "the whole town's batty for that team in Cincinnati." Led by regional talk-show star Ruth Lyons (the Midwest's "Oprah") fans rallied around the Reds as never before. The year didn't begin well for the team. Budding superstar Frank Robinson was arrested right before spring training for carrying a concealed weapon, and long-time owner Powel Crosley Jr., died suddenly just days before the start of the season. Few experts--or fans--gave the Reds much of a chance at first place anyway. With powerhouse teams in Los Angeles, San Francisco, and Milwaukee, the National League pennant was unlikely to fly over Cincinnati's Crosley Field. But manager Hutchinson somehow galvanized his motley crew and led them to victory after victory. Joey Jay, who had languished with the Braves, mowed down hitters while his rotation mates O'Toole and knuckleballer Bob Purkey did the same. The team also featured a dynamic duo in the bullpen in Bill Henry and Jim Brosnan, whose book about the season, Pennant Race, became a national bestseller the following year. As the rest of the league kept waiting for the Reds to fade, Hutch's boys kept winning--and finally grabbed the pennant. Though they couldn't continue their magic in the World Series against the Yankees, the previously moribund Reds franchise did continue to their success throughout the decade, winning 98 games in 1962 and falling just short of another pennant in 1964. They established a recipe for success that would lead, a few years later, to the emergence of the Big Red Machine.

Cincinnati's Crosley Field presents the field's history through text and more than 150 photographs. The Cincinnati Reds played at Crosley Field from 1912 through 1970, and the ballpark holds an iconic place in the city's history as well as throughout Reds Country. One of the most beloved ballparks in Major League history, Crosley Field played host to the first night game and the first of Johnny Vander Meer's back-to-back no-hitters, as well as four World Series and two All-Star games. From the outfield terrace to the "Moon Deck," from Lombardi's "snooze" to Big Klu's biceps, Blackwell's "whip" to Rose's belly-flop slides, the Redlegs to the Big Red Machine, Cincinnati's Crosley Field has them covered in words and pictures. Greg Rhodes and John Erardi also present the great Negro Leagues teams that played at Crosley, as well as the field's many colorful characters, such as longtime announcer Waite Hoyt and the top-hatted vendor known as Peanut Jim. In April 2009, the Reds' Hall of Fame and Museum opens this season's key exhibit, Crosley Field Remembered, and Cincinnati's Crosley Field will be sold at the team's gift shop as a souvenir.

As part of every Reds game broadcast on the Reds Radio Network, Greg Rhodes, noted baseball historian and director of the Reds Hall of Fame and Museum, presents a brief, colorful account of a memorable moment in the history of America's longest-running baseball team. These pieces have become a favorite feature for Reds fans, who love to celebrate the Big Red Machine's long and storied history and traditions. This collection brings together every single one of Rhodes' pieces in a single book for both Reds fans and baseball aficionados. "Cincinnati Reds Hall of Fame Highlights" chronicles more than 130 years of history and five world series championships and includes over 300 short accounts of the team's greatest, saddest, wildest, and weirdest players and moments. Packed with over 100 photos furnished by the Reds and their museum, the book pays tribute to a team that remains one of America's favorites.

In 1988 two fresh college graduates from the U.S. stumbled into newly-emerging China. Greg Rhodes and Heidi Rogers brought a bag of M&M's and a thirst for adventure, but no foreign travel experience, little common sense and even less money. Feeling isolated and deprived, suffering from homesickness and food poisoning, they discussed cutting short their year of teaching English at a university. Despite being completely unprepared for the challenges the Middle Kingdom presented to expats at the time, they persevered and became intimate witnesses to Chengdu's version of the historic events that overwhelmed Tiananmen Square and swept the country in 1989. Join Greg and Heidi as they slowly gain their footing while China seems to lose its own.

At age 40, Greg and Heidi Rhodes kept a rash promise to each other made 17 years earlier, when the naive, mortgage-free expats swore to return to China with their own children. Arriving back in the Middle Kingdom in 2005, they were surprised to find their former home city, Chengdu, unrecognizable. Familiar landmarks and expectations had been swept away by China's rushing tide of progress, replaced by glass skyscrapers, McDonald's restaurants, and a frenetic scramble to get ahead.