If They Don't Win It's a Shame

THE FIRST SENTENCE of an article is called the lede. Sometimes it’s the first several sentences, sometimes just one, but the concept is what counts. A good lede gets your attention and sets the stage. The best ledes can be intriguing, informative, thrilling, even shattering. Some became immortal the second they hit the stands. Two come to mind. The first is Grantland Rice’s famous 1924 account in the New York Herald-Tribune of Notre Dame’s 13-7 win over Army. “Outlined against a blue, grey October sky the Four Horsemen rode again. In dramatic lore they are known as famine, pestilence, destruction, and death. These are only aliases. Their real names are: Stuhldreher, Miller, Crowley, and Layden.” If that doesn’t leave you tingling, I can’t help you, but most of you probably never heard it before. I think it stopped being famous about 30 years ago, during the same tectonic shift when Christopher Columbus became a bad guy, reporters became journalists, spaghetti became pasta, pudding became mousse, and making love became “having sex.”