.Homage to Willie Mays

 

My homage to Willie Mays who died yesterday, June 18, 2024:
A while back, on Facebook's Old St. Paul History, Michael Ries posted an aerial photograph of Metropolitan Stadium in Bloomington Minnesota taken during the 1965 All Star Game. I bragged then in a comment that I am in the picture; I was in the stands that sunny day selling beer to thirsty fans. I believe I had sold a case or more of beer by the time the game began. As was custom in those years, Willie Mays would bat first for the National League. Since the Nationals were the visiting team, his at-bat would open the game. I was not much of a baseball fan. However, I felt it would be an insult, a sacrilege of sorts, to ignore this moment and turn my back on Willie Mays to yell my beer call. Thus, when "play ball" was shouted by the umpire, I was sitting in an aisle somewhere behind home plate--beer case beside me--as Mays came to bat. My tribute and my sit-down-on-the-job did not last long. He hit a home run to left field. I stood up and yelled "Bottle of beer here, bottle of beer!" as I worked my way sale-by-sale to the sunny right-field stands. I do treasure the memory.

 

(c) from date of posting, by Bob Komives, Fort Collins