On Babe's popularity among fans...Linda Ruth Tosetti writes:
“…I feel my grandfather never asked for this admiration, he earned it. It is not something you can buy from the fans or demand. It is there because the fans felt that love and respect Babe had for them and the time he took with each one. That is how Babe Ruth earned his place in history with baseball being his vehicle. When all the memorials are dust, Babe Ruth will always be remembered, especially in the hearts of all baseball fans.”
Babe Ruth Day April 27th 1947
This event at Yankee Stadium was held in honor of my ailing grandfather
L to R-
My sister Ellen, My husband Andy and I standing at home plate with our Ruth #3 jackets. It would be our last tour of the stadium the February before my grandfather's House was torn down. Even though I knew that my grandfather would still be remembered because he is more than brick and mortar, it was the only house I knew.
I hoped it would be saved as a museum where kids could play and an feel the hair stand up on the back of their necks because of the energy of history that was there. Of the greats of many venues played at this sports cathedral. It could have provided jobs and be an asset to the Bronx. It was not to be. It is just a bare space now, its greatness is in the past. It would have made a wonderful landmark.
Yankee Stadium: "The Grand Canyon of Baseball" ~ Mel Allen
"Some ball yard!"
~ Babe Ruth, 1923
"When I first came to Yankee Stadium,
I used to feel like the ghosts
of Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig were walking around in there."
~Mickey Mantle
"Yankee Stadium is something else, a law unto itself.
It has earned the right to look any way it pleases and I would change a seat of it. . . .
It is particularly dreamworthy because not so long ago
the World Series used to turn up there as regularly as Wimbledon.
I once sneaked out to center field myself as a youth
to see how things looked from Mickey Mantle's point of view and felt the same tingle some people get from Civil War battlefields."
~ Wilfred Sheed, in Baseball and Lesser Sports
"People from out of town say ther are three things they want to see - the Statue of Liberty, Radio City, and Yankee Stadium. I guess you could say the stadium is hallowed ground."
~ Bill Waite, an employee at the stadium for over fifty years
"That Babe was some architect."
~ Chipper Jones
"When I came up to the Yanks from Newark at the end of the 1946 season, I took one look at the stadium and thought, 'Geez, whatta big place!'"
~Yogi Berra, commenting in 1996
"I grew up loving Southern League Baseball. When I was four my daddy took me to the old Rickwood Field in Birmingham. Then, coming to Yankee Stadium in 1937 for the first time-where the greats like the Babe, Lou and DiMag played-was just beyond my dreams. Suddenly here I was, a guy supposed to practice law, broadcasting Yankee home games on radio from this mecca of baseball. This was the place, the number-one place in baseball. The stadium was like the Empire State Building or the Grand Canyon of baseball, and every time I stepped inside of it I had to pinch myself!"
~ Mel Allen, the Voice of the Yankees (1946 - 1965)
The Sat. before the last day of closing the stadium. Yes I wore black for mourning.
Highlight of that day was to present Derek with an award for beating one of my grandfather's many records. I was surprised and so was he!! See tron.
The gentleman that Derek is, left batting practice to walk across the field say hello to me. I asked him to take the spirit of my grandfather with him to the new stadium and he did. Thank you Derek. Yes, we all teared up even the security on the field.
