A Baseball Story

                 by  Fred Coleman
                
                 Historic game, memorable 'catch' on a summer afternoon

                 It was a hot July morning in the summer of 1945 when my father announced to my brother and me that we were going to Shibe Park in Philadelphia that Saturday afternoon, along with my Uncle Ed, to see the A's play the Detroit Tigers.  As a 10-year-old (my brother was 14), I was excited but not overly so, since my father had taken us to many games over the years (always the A's, as he was an American League fan).
               When we arrived at our seats in the second deck just oppisite third base, little did I realize that I was in for a long but very rewarding afternoon.  The A's and the Tigers each scored a run and the game was tied 1-1, and tied......and tied......and tied for 24 looong innings!  (The game was finally called after four hours and fifty minutes on account of darkness because Pennsylvania's "blue laws" stated that lights could not be turned on after a certain hour during a day game).
               But back to my story.  In the sixth inning, Bob Maier, Detroit third baseman, hit a foul ball that carried over to where we were sitting but far up in the rafters.  I followed the flight of the ball, and it suddenly hit a beam and dropped into the aisle right beside me (I was sitting on the end seat).  The man sitting across the aisle reached for it, but he didn't have chance against a 10-year-old's reflexes.  I had my foul ball!  And not only that, but it was from a historic game.  In the vernacular of today, I had a two-fer!
              When we got home, my father laboriously printed the essential details of the game (and, of course, my "catch" ) in ink on the ball.  He died in 1993 at the age of 95, but the story is still clearly legible after 68 years.  (Yes, I still have the ball.)
              But wait, the best is yet to come.  In 1997, I read a small article in the Philadelphia Inquirer about the newly formed Philadelphia Athletics Historical Society, located in Warrington, five minutes from where I reside in Jamison.  (It later moved to Hatboro and just recently to Northeast Philadelphia).  I immediately joined, and over the years I have met and become friends with many of my boyhood heroes, including Bobby Shantz, Ferris Fain, Pete Suder, Eddie Joost, Gus Zernial, Lou Brissie, Elmer Valo, Sam Chapman, Joe DiMaestri and Carl Scheib, to name a few.
              The biggest thrill came a few years ago when I met two former A's who played in the game, Irv Hall and Charlie Metro, at one of the society's reunions.  We posed for pictures with the ball, and they signed it for me.  I'm 78 years old now and still goto many Phillies games.  (I had to switch my allegiance after 1954 when the A's left town for Kansas City and eventually Oakland.)  But I never caught another foul ball.