A baseball lifer’s salute to Connie Mack Stadium
Forget Presidents Day. I’m still stuck on Valentine’s Day, and matters of romance.
Which can only mean one thing. Feb. 14, and a young man’s heart turns to .... baseball, of course.
My memory was jogged last week by two things. Those three glorious words pitchers and catchers.
Yes, the Phillies are back in Clearwater. Spring can’t be far behind.
But I also noted another famous Phillies event yesterday in my daily “Today’s Upper” item that I post online.
It was on Feb. 13, 1953, that they changed the name of the famous edifice at 21st and Lehigh in North Philadelphia from Shibe Park to Connie Mack Stadium.
While I was daydreaming about warm summer nights and baseball, my mind drifted back all those years ago.
It was then that I remembered my very first trip to Connie Mack, which did not turn out so well.
Remember, we lived out in the sticks in southern Chester County in a tiny town called Oxford. A quick aside. Oxford has a very famous connection to the Phillies, despite the die-hard Phillies fans in the Heron household. Oxford was the home of one Mr. John Ogden, who just happened to be a Phillies scout. Ogden was credited with traveling to another small town — Wampum, Pa., — where he signed a young slugger. That young man’s name was Richie Allen.
Kids in town would hang around Ogden’s house in the hopes that he would emerge and offer us Phillies tickets, which he did from time to time.
Most of the time, a visit to faraway Philadelphia and our major league heroes was left to my father.
One day every summer, my father, a proud native of Southwest Philly, would collect his sons and make the jaunt in to see our beloved Phils.
Actually, that was just the icing on the cake. Dad would use the day to visit his brother Charles, who just happened to own a fairly famous taproom at 33rd and Market streets. Heron’s was just down the street from Franklin Field, and was a favorite watering hole for several members of the Eagles, who played their games at the cavernous facility on the Penn campus.
For my father, it was a chance to spend an afternoon with his brother, talk about old times, and enjoy a few cold beverages. In those few hours, my father was in his element, and the tiny town of Oxford seemed very far away indeed.
My brothers and I would play endless games of shuffleboard bowling on the machine in the corner, while wolfing down roast beef sandwiches and root beers.
For years I had to watch, being the youngest in the family, as my older brothers piled into dad’s massive old Pontiac to make the trek into the city. Mom still considered me too young for the city sights. I guess I must have been about 9 or 10 when she finally consented to me joining this decidedly boys’ adventure. It was sometime in the early ‘60s.
I was beside myself.
The Dodgers were in town. Now my father was not the kind of man who carefully planned out these things. Remember, the key part of the day for him was sitting at that bar and visiting his brother.
I had heard so many stories from my brothers about how the grass at Connie Mack was the purest green they had ever seen. Eventually, we left the tap room and drove up to North Philadelphia, found a parking spot in the neighborhood, and dad obliged the kids who approached and offered to “watch the car for a quarter.” Usually right outside the Wilson Sporting Goods factory just a few blocks from the stadium. Dad let it be known that it was not a good idea to ignore the kids’ pitch.
It wasn’t until we approached the stadium that I sensed a bit of trouble.
There was a long line at the ticket window.
We made our way to the back of the line and waited.
And waited.
Eventually, a gentleman appeared to offer the sad news. That night’s twinighter was sold out. Yes, they actually played double-headers in those days. On this day, one of the magical twi-nighters, one game starting in later afternoon, the other at night, all for the price of one ticket.
A ticket we would not acquire that day. On my first trip to Connie Mack Stadium, I did not get in.
And for good reason.
The starting pitchers that night for the Dodgers? Just a couple of guys you might have heard of named Koufax and Drysdale. And for the Phils? Our heroes - Jim Bunning and Chris Short.
Can you believe it?
In the ensuing years, I made several trips to Connie Mack with dad, and yes, I can still remember just how green that grass was. The following summer, my brother insisted on the tradition of holding his hands over my eyes as we walked down the tunnel toward our seats. When he finally removed them, I was dazzled. Surely even the Emerald Isle did not contain a patch of green to match this lot in North Philadelphia.
The massive Ballantine scoreboard loomed over the structure, which reeked of peanuts and cigars. In other words, baseball heaven.
For some reason, while I attended a handful of games at Connie Mack in the ensuing years, the one that sticks in the memory is the one I missed. I’ll never forget my first trip.
A church now stands at 21st and Lehigh. They tore what was left of Connie Mack down years ago. Actually, the fans got an early start on the demolition, literally trying to tear the place apart with their bare hands on the final day of the 1970 season. The Philly faithful were intent on taking home any part of the old place they could pry loose, including the seats. A fire destroyed much of the structure a few years later.
It was replaced by a giant bowl in South Philadelphia called Veterans Stadium. It was the days of what would be called “multi-purpose” stadiums, a place both the Phillies and Eagles called home.
That was before baseball rediscovered its soul - and its past - first in places like Camden Yard in Baltimore, then at Citizens Bank Park in South Philly.
But there will never be another place like Connie Mack.
Not to a 10-year-old kid whose eyes were bigger than those massive circles on the Ballantine scoreboard.
Even on a night when he didn’t get in.