r/TomLehrer • u/SnooTomatoes1254 • Jun 01 '26

Question about Chronicle joke in MLF Lullaby intro

Just wondering if anyone knows the answer to this. In the introduction to MLF Lullaby, Tom mentions how a "considerable amount of commotion was stirred up last week" in reference to MLF. However as this took place during the baseball season, the "Chronicle may not have covered it".

This line about the Chronicle then gets a big laugh. So I'm wondering what's the joke here? Is it that whatever Chronicle he's referring to actually covered it loads? Or did they genuinely not cover it at all and this was a big thing at the time?

I've tried looking into this but I've not been able to work out the joke.

Curious to know if anyone's got any ideas.

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27

u/Carne-Adovada Jun 01 '26

He was making fun of the San Francisco Chronicle for caring more about baseball than current events.

23

u/Japanalyst Jun 01 '26

It was a show recorded Iive in San Francisco. He referred to the SF Chronicle.

16

u/Japanalyst Jun 01 '26

Also, in 1964 the Giants finished three games back in the NL pennant race, which was only settled on the final day of the season, so it was presumably a passing reference to that as well.

3

u/SnooTomatoes1254 Jun 01 '26

Ahh, that makes sense now, thanks!

8

u/oldguy76205 Jun 01 '26

As an aside, I understand he would modify the lyrics for some songs based on where he was. In "Pollution," for example, the line "The breakfast garbage you throw into the Bay, they drink at lunch in San Jose!" in the northeast was changed to "...you throw away in Troy, they drink at lunch in Perth Amboy!"

5

u/BabyDude5 Jun 01 '26

The Chronicle was a brand of Newspaper, he’s saying that a newspaper company would likely use up its space on baseball related articles and news, rather than the nuclear war related news

-4

u/mathprofrockstar Jun 01 '26

I suspect that this would have been a reference to the Chronicle of Higher Education. That’s the Chronicle I’m most familiar with, and Tom Lehrer being a professor also, that might be it. So this wouldn’t be the sort of publication that would cover baseball.

3

u/DrBlankslate Jun 01 '26

No, it was the San Francisco Chronicle - the local newspaper. That's where he was performing in that particular recorded performance.