Authors: Glenn Stout

Fenway 1912 (62 page)

Although some accounts written well after the fact state that Devore caught Cady's drive with his bare hand, I could find no contemporaneous account that mentions it—such reports have about as much credibility as those that suggest that Devore faked the catch. Later writers may have confused this catch by Devore with either Hooper's catch of a ball hit by Devore later in the Series, which was caught barehanded, or reports that refer to Devore making the catch with "one hand." At the time, given the gloves in use, one-handed catches—particularly one-handed catches made on the run—were unique enough to be mentioned in news accounts.

A report in
Sporting Life
on October 19, 1912, states that Mathewson brought up the issue of the division of playoff receipts with the Red Sox "on the train to Boston on the night of October 10, the day after the 11 inning tie game." However, there was no such train, as the two clubs had traveled to Boston on the night of October 8 and remained in Boston for game 3 the next day. In the context of the larger story, the author was probably referring to the train to New York on the evening of October 10. Both the
New York Tribune
and the
Boston Herald
of October 16 refer to another meeting with the National Commission on October 15, leading me to conclude that there were at least two meetings between the commission and Mathewson in regard to the issue.

There is one particular error in Mike Vaccaro's
The First Fall Classic
(New York: Random House, 2009) that bears correcting, and I mention the discrepancy here so that readers of both books will know why our accounts differ so drastically. Vaccaro describes Hooper's key game 5 triple in some detail. But he misplaces the hit in center field and even details how outfielder Fred Snodgrass first came in on the ball "two steps," then went back, and then had to retrieve the ball after it became stuck in a "tiny hole" at the extreme end of the bleachers in center field, leading to a colorful and extended argument between Giants manager John McGraw and umpire Silk McLoughlin.

None of this took place. As multiple newspaper sources,
baseball-reference.com
, and retrosheet.org all agree, and as I describe in the text, the ball was not hit to either center field or even left-center field—it was hit down the left-field line and bounced into the small "pie-shaped" triangle of open ground between the third-base stands, the Duffy's Cliff bleachers, and the left-field wall, roughly the location just beyond the roll-up garage door that occasionally vexes left fielders in Fenway Park today. There it was indisputably retrieved by Giants left fielder Josh Devore. Vaccaro evidently confused the pie-shaped triangle of Ralph McMillen's description with the much larger space in center field between the left-field wall and the center-field bleachers, where the flagpole stood. Although this center-field space had been in play for most of the season, the accommodations made for the World's Series blocked this area off with a stockade fence. It is also important to note that neither of these "triangles" is the same as the current "triangle" that exists in Fenway Park just to the center-field side of the bullpen. Later in the book Vaccaro also confuses Hooper's misplaced hit with a later triple by Steve Yerkes. These are but two illustrations of why I chose not to use this volume as a source.

It is also interesting to note that when McLaughlin's accommodations for the World's Series were first built, this area was much larger and extended to the far end of the new third-base stands. At some point between the end of the regular season and the start of the World's Series, however, a fence much closer to the foul line was created, presumably to prevent balls from rolling out of sight at the end of the third-base stands.

Chapter 14: Last Stand at Fenway Park

"
I thought my foot was off the rubber":
Billy Evans, "Careless Players Make Blunders, O'Brien's Balk Reminds Many Leading Athletes of Costly Mistakes,"
New York Times,
December 8, 1912.

"
Royal Rooters An Angry Lot":
Boston Globe,
October 16, 1912.

"
All Knock Wood":
New York World,
October 16, 1912.

"
Boston Now Supreme in Baseball World":
Boston Globe,
October 17, 1912.

Epilogue

"A War in Red Sox Camp,"
Sporting Life,
July 12, 1913, and "Warring Factions Slump Boston Team,"
New Castle
(Penn.)
News,
May 13, 1913, outline the breakup of the 1913 Sox.

"
hadn't been strong with the Boston manager":
Chester
(Penn.)
Times,
August 7, 1913.

Subsequent changes in Fenway Park through 1987 are outlined in Glenn Stout, "Forever Fenway," in
The Official 1987 Red Sox Yearbook.
Major changes after 1987 are described at
redsox.com
. It is interesting to note that the property on the corner of Brookline Avenue and Lansdowne Street was not purchased by the Red Sox until 1980, to house NESN (New England Sports Network). The lot was first built on in 1913, when former New Hampshire governor John Smith purchased the property. Over the years it served as the home to dealerships for Packard and Cadillac automobiles, Boston's first television station, WMEX radio, a retail store owned by golfer Francis Ouimet, the real estate firm Jeano Inc. (for which Joe Cronin served as president), a bowling alley, and several other businesses.

Each year major league baseball calculates a "Fan Cost Index" measuring the total price for a typical family of four to see a game. The FCI includes the price of two children's tickets, two adult tickets, four small soft drinks, four hot dogs, two small drinks, two programs, and parking. In 2010 Fenway Park's FCI was $334.78, making it the most expensive ballpark in the major leagues.

"Jerome Kelly [
sic
] Resigns,"
Boston Globe,
June 9, 1921.

Appendix: Boston Red Sox 1912 Statistics

BATTING