"Sporting Venture"

St. Louis Cardinal Owner Fred Saigh, dolefully facing 15 months in prison for income-tax evasion (TIME, Feb. 9), last week made good on promises to: 1) get out of baseball, and 2) do all he could to keep the Cardinals where they belong--in St. Louis. For $3,750,000--after turning down a bigger offer from minor-league Milwaukee--Saigh sold the Cardinals to Anheuser-Busch, Inc. The new Cardinal president: August A. Busch Jr., 53, third-generation boss of the family brewing business.

"Gussie" Busch promised to take an active interest in the club, hailed hard-riding Manager Eddie Stanky as "one of the greatest managers in baseball today," and promised: "We hope to make the Cardinals one of the greatest baseball teams of all time."

What about the fact that a rival St. Louis brewery (Greisedieck) holds a 1953 contract to trumpet about its own brews as the Cardinals' radio & TV sponsor? Said Gussie Busch: "We are going into this as a sporting venture, not as a sales promotion."

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