DiMaggio has cancer, news report says
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Posted on Nov 26 1998
New York Yankees legend Joe DiMaggio has lung cancer and suffered a heart attack last week, television station WPIX reported.
The Hall of Fame outfielder has been hospitalized in Hollywood, Fla., since Oct. 12 for what his attorney Morris Engelberg said was pneumonia and a lung infection.
But WPIX reported Monday that DiMaggio, who will be 84 on Wednesday, had a tumor removed from his lung last month.
The station, which has televised Yankees games for 48 years, cited three sources who spoke on condition of anonymity. WPIX news executives declined to elaborate on the sourcing.
The station said Yankees owner George Steinbrenner canceled a planned visit last week and was toldDiMaggio probably wouldn’t have recognized him, anyway.
The report also said friends of DiMaggio were concerned about who was in control of his estate, which WPIX said includes an estimated $20 million collectibles and memorabilia fortune.
Officials at Memorial Regional Hospital have not provided information on DiMaggio’s condition; switchboard operators have even denied DiMaggio is a patient.
During the past two weeks, DiMaggio’s attorney faxed two updates on his condition to the media, the last of which said DiMaggio was improving after being very ill.
“He is doing well,” a spokeswoman for attorney Engelberg told The Associated Press on Friday. She was unable to provide details.
Engelberg’s wife returned a message left on her husband’s answering machine Monday night by saying he couldn’t get to the phone — he was asleep.
In 13 seasons with the Yankees, DiMaggio played in 11 All-Star Games and was the American League’s most valuable player three times. His 56-game hitting streak in 1941 is still a record.
Associated Press
