He wasn't, like some of his fellow bishops, an impressive figure. Nor was he an accomplished speaker, like some others. And he wasn't a scholar. But he was the undisputed leader of the American Church. And what Cardinal Francis Joseph Spellman did, he did well. George Kelly, a priest who worked closely with Spellman, compared him to Eddie Stanky of the Brooklyn Dodgers. Stanky wasn't the best catcher, the best fielder, or the best hitter. He was just the leader. And so it was with Spellman.
The son of a prosperous grocer, Frank Spellman attended public schools in Whitman, Massachusetts, before moving to New York in 1907 to attend Fordham University. Living in New York, he reasoned, "would be an education in itself." Active in sports and academics, by his senior year he decided on the priesthood. In 1911, he entered the prestigious North American College, a Roman seminary long known as a training ground for future bishops.
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