As we enter the single digits, we are getting in a Delorean and going back to the future to old school. I always admired leftfielders because that was my position I loved the most. Wallace Wade “Wally” Moon played for the Cardinals (1954-58) and the Dodgers (1959-8-1965). He was an all-star 3 times, won the World Series twice (55 and 59), and was the 1954 Rookie of the Year. The Cards got Moon when they dealt Enos Slaughter to the Yankees. In Moon’s first at bat, the home crowd was chanting “we want Slaughter!” Moon quieted the Cardinals’ crowd quickly when he hit a home run in first major league at bat.
When he became a Dodger, they played in the old Coliseum. The right field fence was 441 feet away, while left field was only 251 feet away. They “protected” the short porch with a 42 foot screen wall. Moon decided to adjust his stance so he could hit to left field, and his towering home runs were appropriately called “moon shots.”
A personal story about the Coliseum. On Roy Campanella Day, my Dad took us all to a Dodger game on May 7, 1959. (My future wedding anniversary date again!). 93, 103 people attended that game setting a record for the largest crowd at a baseball game. I was 6 years old and only remember one thing from that game. During the tribute to Campanella, they turned off all the lights in the stadium and had people hold up a lighter or match. There were lots of smokers back then, and our Dad smoked a pipe. I can still remember him holding up his lighter, and I recall looking at the tens of thousands of lights around the darken stadium. It was pretty cool. I’ve heard it isn’t a record anymore, but when I checked on the web, I saw two different answers and both of them were less than 93 thousand, so I betting that this record still stands to this day.
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