(Randy's Perspective)
This was St. Louis Cardinals weekend. Cardinals-Rangers on Saturday. But first things first. A couple of interesting things– no make that three interesting things – happened on the way to the park. Two of them took place on Friday in Southern Indiana.
We
had chosen to see the Cardinals this weekend in part because Penny had
been away from her daughter, Rachel, for a little too long. Rachel and
her fiancé, Marc, live in Evansville, Indiana, two and a half hours from
St. Louis. So we headed from West Virginia to Evansville – en route to
St. Louis. We were in Evansville on Friday.I’ll go in reverse order on what happened that day and night. At night, we went to a terrific venue called Bosse Field.
As background, I should tell you that my three favorite baseball movies (documentaries not included) are Field of Dreams, Bull Durham and A League of Their Own. And I had often wondered where they filmed the game scenes in A League of Their Own. Where is/was that cool park where Tom Hanks and Geena Davis and Madonna worked?
Well, the answer to that trivia question is Evansville, Indiana. Bosse Field. With only Wrigley and Fenway being older, Bosse Field (built in 1915) is the third-oldest stadium in the country still being used for league games. In this case, it’s the independent Frontier League. Bosse Field is home to the Evansville Otters.
The stadium up close was everything I could have imagined. It was as authentic as it could have been, and the Friday night Frontier League game had all the bells and whistles of a minor league game – in 1950. And I mean that as a compliment.
Penny kept saying, “I can’t believe this place place. This is seriously back in time.” I agreed.
Vendors were a throwback. So were my favorite attractions of the evening: the Otter Belles, “ball girls” dressed in skirts similar to those worn by players in the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League. There’s a colorful painted sign above the third-base seating area: Support the Racine Belles.
There was also a “modern” quirk that you could only find in a minor league baseball park. Just behind the first-base dugout, in the “box seats,” there are two recliners. They were occupied. I guess you can buy tickets for the leather recliners.
Speaking of tickets, the Otters sell plenty of them. Since their first game in 1994, they have averaged 2,500 fans per game, a remarkable number considering the unaffiliated nature of the home team.
The dugouts are cool, much closer to home plate than modern dugouts. It’s as if a person in the first-base dugout could carry on a standard conversation with someone in the third-base dugout.
As I was sitting in the stands staring at the third-base dugout, I couldn’t help but imagine Tom Hanks storming to the top of the steps saying, “Are you crying? … There’s no crying in baseball!”
A fun, fun evening.
The first adventure of the day had nothing to do with baseball.
Our route from West Virginia carried us through Louisville. From Louisville, it’s a couple of hours to Evansville. But roughly an hour west of Louisville and east of Evansville is a magical place, at least as far as Penny is concerned. That place is Santa Claus, Indiana.
Penny loves Christmas, therefore, she loves Santa Claus, In fact, she has an incredible collection of Santas that I have to drag out of storage every November and put back into storage sometime around New Year’s Day. There are hundreds. So, obviously, a town named Santa Claus would call to her. (Which meant it was calling me, too.)
We made the trip to Santa Claus on Friday. Here’s Santa Claus, Indiana, in a nutshell. Every business is Christmas themed. We had out pictures made with SC – on June 23. There are three lakes in town: Christmas, Holly and Noel. The streets are mostly named after Christmas things.
Bottom line, Penny would move there tomorrow.
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