It was 1963 or 64 when my dad and mom took my brother and me to our first Major League Baseball (MLB) game. I remember this game because it was the first or second annual ‘Bat Day’ at Tiger Stadium. I remember arriving in the ball park area and parking in a front yard near the stadium. There were no parking lots so most nearby homes were using their yards as parking areas for game attendee’s. For a couple of bucks, you could park in their yard and walk the short distance to the stadium gates. It was a great way to supplement their income. The cars were parked bumper to bumper and door to door, like sardines in a can. Most of the places required you to leave your keys in the car so the home owner could move your car if the person parked between you and the house wanted to leave before you got to your car. It was definitely a different time in history. I wouldn’t even consider that today.
When we got through the turnstiles and entered the park, there was a huge crowd around a stadium employee that was taking the little league sized Louisville Slugger baseball bat from its shipping box and handing one to every child aged 14 and under. I was handed a bat with William “Gates” Brown signature engraved on the barrel and I believe my brother got Bill Freehan. Well, it wasn’t the Al Kaline I wanted or Rocky Colavito that my brother would have preferred, but they were real bats! The Tigers had these giveaways every year until sometime in the 70’s.
I can’t possibly describe the sound of nearly 20,000 full-size wooden bats being rhythmically pounded on the concrete and steel floor of the upper decks and the fans yelling “We want a hit, we want a hit, we want a hit” when the Tigers came to bat each and every inning! I’m sure you could hear it in the next city, but I know you could actually feel the stadium floor vibrate to the pounding beat of those bats! There was a slight sense of fear in all of the attendee’s that the stadium would collapse at some point! Those bats were at the house at least until I went into the service in 1969. I’m sure my brother had them until he enlisted in 1972.
This was the beginning of a love of MLB ballparks. Of course I visited Tiger Stadium many times after that. Eighteen times in 1968 alone. I attended some amazing games there, like Denny McClain’s 30th win in September of that year and on the night the Tigers clinched the pennant, I was in the left field upper deck, the only place we could get tickets. What a party that night was. Everyone was trying to reach their car but nobody wanting to leave the stadium area! One weekend, my bowling buddy Ed M. and I left a Canadian fishing trip, drove from Sault Ste. Marie to Tiger Stadium (about 560 miles) to see the Tigers play.
I’ve been to 30+ MLB stadiums since those days. I have not visited them all. In fact there are 9 teams I have not visited their home fields and 6 newer stadiums I’ve missed, but I hope to some day. If the math doesn’t work out for you, I’ve been to multiple ballparks in cities like Detroit, San Diego, Atlanta, New York, Chicago, San Francisco, and others. If this is a dream of yours, we should talk.