"MEMORIES OF OLD BELL PARK"

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HOW A BASEBALL PARK LOOKS TO A KID!
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Driving by old Bell Park, a few years back, I was amazed at how something that once seemed so incredibly big to me, later seemed so incredibly small!

There's an old song that says: "How ya gonna keep 'em down on the  farm----after they've seen Paree?" Yes, that song may be true, for I've seen a number of baseball parks over the years, since the first time I saw Bell Park in 1940, and they were all bigger. Not better, however.

If you've never really noticed the mind-blowing effect of walking into a professional baseball park (any size) AT NIGHT,  do yourself a favor and try it. Take a boy with you---any age boy!

You will park in a dimly-lit drab parking lot several hundred feet away, walk up to a drab gate, also dimly-lit, walk across a drab paved area, to the entrance---up a long drab concrete ramp and reach the top walkway/aisle going left and right---and there opening out in front of you is: THE MOST GLORIOUS SIGHT! Is this HEAVEN? No, it is a baseball park!

There are LIGHTS, LIGHTS, LIGHTS---BRIGHT LIGHTS! Unfolding in front of your very eyes---is a PANORAMIC VIEW---stretching left and right... and center---so mind-boggling that your eyes can scarcely take it in!  COLOR EVERYWHERE YOU LOOK!

GREEN, beautifully manicured grass playing field, stretching all the way to the fence! Fresh white boundary lines---foul/fair--- raked sandy soil topping the infield, just sprayed with misty water to keep the dust down; rich contrast---grass and infield soil!

Players in beautiful, colored uniforms, freshly-cleaned, spiffy---no dirt or grass stains on them---but just wait! They are throwing white baseballs all over the place; balls are bouncing and rolling everywhere it seems. You think you can almost see the stitching on the balls! Little boys are in awe---they've never seen this many new baseballs at once; and NONE are wrapped in black friction tape! Somebody here has money!

That scoreboard out in left-center field---empty of numerals right now---its very blankness is promising at least 8 1/2 innings of exciting baseball! That kid up there is checking his numerals; I guess it's his way of "warming up." Is that a baseball glove he has up there?

The whole dark green outfield fence (aren't they always dark green?) is covered with advertisements.

That's the third base coach over there by the dugout. Is he practicing his signals or do his
nose and ear lobes just itch? Uh-oh, now he's scratching...ER, let's move on, and let him practice.

There are two players out there in shallow left field: they start all of a sudden and run side-by-side for the left field fence, full blast for about forty steps; they stop suddenly and walk back to the dugout as if they forgot something.

WAIT! There's some goofy-looking guy, with a long nose, out there, wearing an oversized  baseball shirt with a numeral, baggy pants, crazy shoes, and his cap is on---sideways! Is he a manager? He's clowning around with the "private box" fans behind home plate. He LOOKS almost like...a clown!

IS THIS AN EVENT...OR WHAT!

Two pitchers, from the Pioneers, a righty and a lefty, are in the bull pen, warming up. Who will start? We'll have to wait and see what strategy is cooking here tonight in the manager's mind. The lefty, before he throws the ball, makes a curious little circular inward motion with his pitching arm. A signal to the catcher! Wo! Get ready for a wicked inside-breaking curve ball!

At old Bell Park, your "wild and wooly" guys, (yes, our dads), sat on the hard (roofless) cement bleachers on the  first base line. THIS was "where it was at!" Your cigar-smokers, pipe smokers, and a few chewers sat there. (Who ever heard of "No Smoking" in the 40's?) There were a couple of New York/Brooklyn guys too! They were fun to sit by. You could spot them by the piles of peanut shells under them...and by their street-smart comments: "HEY DARE TOMMY, SHAKE IT OFF!"  "HEY BILL OUT DARE--- WAKE UP, PAL!" "OKAY GUYS, DIS IS OUR INNING!" "TROW DA BUM OUT!" "UMP, YA BLIND?"

Those three guys in the black suits coats (black coats that to little boys are miraculously filled somehow with an endless supply of white-stitched baseballs), have been huddling over there away from home plate for quite awhile. Hmmm. Unlike any other three American guys, there has not been a single laugh! Wonder what we are in for?

Grady Maples and R.B. MacAlister, and/or their sports guy, are ready up in the KICA booth. The shaggers are ready to chase foul balls; the scoreboard kid is ready. The smokers have lit their cigars in the raunchy-guys' first base bleachers section; the chewers have just cut a new chaw of Spark Plug tobacco (along with some of the players!) The merchants in their boxes behind home plate have their one dollar bills rolled up, ready for the first friendly home run. The New York (entertaining) street-smart guys are ready with their peanuts,,,and no doubt some pithy comments!

That important-looking ump, holding his cute little whisk broom walks out and brushes home plate. The National Anthem is played; the important ump shouts: "PLAY BALL," and the Clovis Pioneers take the field!

GOTTA GO! SEE YOU LATER!

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BY MIL
9/09/12







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