I Still Remember Her by Warren E. “Woodsie” Woods
I remember the first time we met. I was 12 and she was 53 years old. She was beautiful; she was everything that I had heard about her and more. She didn’t wear earrings. There was no necklace, no lipstick, no perfume. Yet though more than 40 years difference in our ages, she was charming and alluring that day and she seduced me.
I literally ran away from home to see her. Yes it was just for a few hours and then of course I returned home to worried parents. I came from rural Fridley and she resided in south Minneapolis. This lady was unique, different from any other. Her measurements 336-435-279 are ingrained in my memory forever. And the mere mention of her name, Nicollet . . . Nicollet Park can yet cause me to smile and make my heart beat a little faster. That day in 1949, Saturday, April 30th, we met for the first time. Ten cents—one dime—was all that I paid to enter and experience the intimacy of her beauty and to view her private world.
Nicollet was nestled in a section where business and industry merged with homes. Her borders were the bright lights and noisy traffic of Lake Street and Nicollet Avenue. Her softer side touched residences and family dwellings on Blaisdell Avenue and 31st Street. From the moment I walked through the little gate, I was transformed by her unparalleled charm. As the usher took the ticket stub, he directed me to a section beyond third base where other knot-hole youth and uniformed boy scouts were rapidly increasing in numbers. As I sat on the wooden bleacher plank, I was in awe of this new happening. It was as if Nicollet was silently speaking to me. “LOOK AT ME! HERE I AM! LOOK AT ME! ” And look I did. After all I had listened to every radio broadcast on WLOL during the 1948 season and heard Dick Enroth’s voice as he referenced various landmarks during the course of the 77 home games. And now reality was replacing imagination.
The field was cloaked with a gown of rich green. Grass manicured and cut with such precision that I was sure it rivaled the groomed golf greens of Interlachen, Minikahda, and Augusta. Two brilliantly white chalked foul lines gave shape to her figure. She sported a diamond that seemed to sparkle with three white canvas bases spaced in an arrangement of 90 feet apart. Equally white (but without fabric) was homeplate. This 17 inch wide stationary object would soon be the center of activity where pitchers would use as a target in attempts to fool the hitter and batters would take swings in their attempts to prove to the pitcher that they weren’t fooled.
Looking to my left I saw the American Association scoreboard and just above was the large round Bulova clock suspended from two steel poles. The left field was a series of eight side-by-side metal advertisement billboards that extended to centerfield. The centerfield wall was barren of advertising. Painted in dark green, this wall was higher, about twenty feet tall. In front of it was a flag pole with the flag hanging limply some forty feet from ground level. The portable batting cage was parked nearby and could become a contending nemesis for a centerfielder when a flyball carried to this distance. The outfield wall from this point became two-tiered. Except for the National and American League scoreboards in right-center, 16 metal double-decked sign-boards completed this wall until it reached the foul line. As if the 279 foot distance was not enough of an inviting target for left-handed batters, Nicollet teased and flirted with the hitter as the rightfield grandstand that had run parallel with the foul line, began angling inward as it approached the bull pen. Like a woman’s narrow waist that flared downward to her hip, so did Nicollet slowly and subtly thrust her curvy structure into fair territory. Two rows of bleacher seats for 17 feet made it even more tempting. It was possible to achieve a 262 foot home run in this very specific area.
Time passed quickly. Going into the bottom of the ninth, the Minneapolis Millers were losing 10 to 8. Hitters on both teams were getting the better of the pitchers. There had been 7 homeruns; Columbus had two, the Millers hit 5, yet were behind. The Columbus relief pitcher seemed to be confident as he went to the mound in the ninth. He had retired the Millers 1-2-3 the previous inning and many of us expected that it would finish with the Redbirds winning. However, Nicollet must have recalled the wisdom of Yogi Berra, the Millers rallied for 3 runs for a come-from-behind 11 to 10 victory. It was an unbelievable, memorable day.
Nicollet had seven siblings. They had names like Borchert in Milwaukee, Swayne in Toledo, Victory in Indianapolis, Blues in Kansas City, Red Bird in Columbus, Parkway in Louisville. She also had a sister in St. Paul by the name of Lexington Park. Lexington (who was one year younger than Nicollet) died in a fire. City fathers and mothers in St. Paul got together and in 1916 rebuilt and renamed this child, Lexington also. She resided on the same grounds as her predecessor did though she faced in the opposite direction. I had a passionate radio romance with Lexington in 1947 when I discovered baseball. When that season finished, I ended this affair and in 1948 began one with Nicollet. This ardor increased and led to that special 1949 Saturday. I was loyal to Nicollet and the Minneapolis Millers and except for a single time during the summer of 1953, I had never seen any of her brothers or sisters. In 1953 I attended a game in Lexington with Hu-Hu and his dad. While this was enjoyable and she was very pretty, in my eyes Lexington could not match the inner beauty of Nicollet. I have maintained that night was only a fling and NOT an affair.
Nicollet and I saw each other only once after that. It was Thursday, July 21st, 1955 and Nicollet hosted the All-Star Game. The Millers played a collection of the other teams’ best players that were determined by fan voting. This time I went with my friend Ralph. [Little did I realize then that another Miller would play an important role in my future. A 14½ year old girl by the name of Karen Miller was living just 2 miles west of the ballpark. She would become my wife 5½ years later and Ralph would be the best man at our wedding.] On this second visit to Nicollet, you might say I didn’t get to “first base.” Ralph and I had general admission tickets and we sat in the front row of the rightfield bleachers. Our seats were so close to the field that we could carry a conversation with the pitcher as he warmed up if we chose to. We were sitting where Nicollet began her slinky curve.
It had been six years since my first visit with Nicollet. I was older and more mature and savvy (at least in a baseball sense). During the pregame warm-ups and player introductions I found myself looking across the diamond to the third base side and reflecting to that 1949 April day when my romance with Nicollet began. Nicollet was older too. She was in her 60th year and this was to be her last season. Construction had already begun on a new ball park 10 miles to the south in Bloomington. Next April the Millers would be playing in Metropolitan Stadium. Five years later major league baseball with the arrival of the Minnesota Twins would be using this facility. The same year the Minnesota Vikings of the NFL would call this their home too. The new stadium would be vastly different from Nicollet. It offered ample parking. A large electronic scoreboard replaced the three manuals and the hanging numbers. No more metal billboards serving as outfield walls. A 15 foot wide warning track in the new park to alert outfielders and honest to goodness individual seats that replaced the plank version at Nicollet. And that unique, intimate rightfield zone where 17 feet of roofed bleachers jutting and crossing into fair territory would not be duplicated. I thought about all of the history and excitement that the little park witnessed. Baseball legends through the years with names of Rube Benton, Joe Hauser, Ted Williams, Babe Barna, Ray Dandridge, Willie Mays, and Hoyt Wilhelm. Nicollet could call them as her own.
In 1957 Cary Grant and Deborah Kerr co-starred in a film with the title, AN AFFAIR TO REMEMBER. I fondly recall my two affairs with Nicollet. With all of her charisma, color, and coziness she was one unforgettable lady.
Warren E. Woods
4/21/08
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Calendar
June 3—Bunny’s Bloody Mary Breakfast, 9:00 a.m. Bunny’s Northeast, northwest quadrant of Broadway and Marshall in northeast Minneapolis.
June 10—Book Club and Vintage Game Video Club, Barnes & Noble, Har Mar Mall, Roseville, 9:30 a.m., The Catcher Was a Spy: The Mysterious Life of Moe Berg by Nicholas Dawidoff and the 1981 All-Star Game.
June 23—Townball: Cannon Falls Bears at Dundas Dukes, 7:30 p.m., Memorial Park. For more information, contact Stew Thornley, 651-415-0791.
July 8—Fred Souba Hot Stove Saturday Morning, Curran’s, 42nd and Nicollet, 9:00 a.m.
July 15—Northwoods League: Waterloo Bucks at Mankato MoonDogs, 6:05 p.m. (pre-game events starting at 1:00 p.m.), Franklin Rogers Park. For more information, contact Stew Thornley, 651-415-0791.
July 24—Research Committee meeting and SABR convention recap, 7:00 p.m, Ridgedale Library, Minnetonka. For more information, contact Brenda Himrich, 651-415-0791,or Sarah Johnson.
July 29—Northwoods League: Mankato MoonDogs at Thunder Bay BorderCats, 6:05 p.m., Port Arthur Stadium. For more information, contact Stew Thornley, 651-415-0791.
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