Early Years
City Fights To Get National League Team
By BRAD GROZNIK
New York is baseball town.
When the Giants packed their bags for San Francisco and the Dodgers headed just down the coast to Los Angeles after the 1957 season, the City wept.

For those who grew up despising the Yankees, there was no use trying to convert. The City knew it had to do all in its power for a second chance and a second franchise.

The politics of baseball were a hotbed and symbolic of the end of the 50s. The Giants and Dodgers entered in to talks with the west coast each being offered what they wanted, and weren’t getting from New York.

William Shea

For the Giants, their field at the Polo Grounds was dilapidated and interest in building a new stadium to replace the Polo Grounds for the floundering franchise were distant. At first, Minneapolis-St. Paul seemed most appealing. In the Twin Cities, the Giants had their farm team, the Minneapolis Millers. But soon an offer from George Christopher, San Francisco’s mayor, landed on the table with the help of Dodger’s manager Walter O’Malley.

O’Malley had been in talks with the the City for sometime, hoping to work out a deal with then Mayor Robert Wagner and legendary power broker Robert Moses.

O’Malley wanted a new stadium too, but he wanted to own it. He wanted the revenue from everything – from parking to tickets to concessions. In return he would front the cost for the entire project.

O’Malley was convinced that the ideal spot for a new stadium was on the corner of Atlantic and Flatbush avenues in Brooklyn.

But Moses said no. He wanted the City to rent the stadium to O’Malley and back the bonds needed to build the stadium from the revenue. Secondly, Moses wanted the stadium to be built in Flushing Meadows Park, which would host the World’s Fair in 1964. The stadium would be Moses’ coliseum.

So O’Malley began to search outside of New York for a city that would offer him what he wanted. Los Angeles came calling and offered him the deal he was looking for. However, LA would only sign under the condition that a second team followed them to the Golden State. At the time there was no Major League Baseball west of Missouri.

Robert Moses

At the start of the 1958 season, New York had lost both the Giants and the Dodgers.
“New York was never going to be a National League town,” said Bob Mandt, a long-time Mets employee and consultant.

After losing two teams in one season, New York was not on baseball’s good side. The bourgeoning business at first refused to offer an expansion team to the City, still without a decent stadium.

But the City was in need of National League baseball. Up for reelection, Mayor Wagner vowed to bring National League play back to New York. He created a four-man task force and reached out to a local lawyer named William Alfred “Bill” Shea to be on the committee.
Shea was Harvard educated and in 1957 one of the City’s best lawyers, he was asked to champion the cause of bringing the National League back to the Big Apple.

At first he tried the exact same tactics that California was employing. He approached the Cincinnati Reds, Philadelphia Phillies and the Pittsburgh Pirates but no team would uproot.
Shea then decided to uproot Major League Baseball by making the announcement that a third league would begin playing, the Continental League.

The threat forced MLB to add four expansion teams; two for the American League and two for the National League.

In 1961, the Los Angeles Angels and the Washington Senators began batting and fielding in the American League and a year later, in 1962, the New York Metropolitans and the Houston Colt .45s were uniformed.

The Mets began their first season in 1962 at the Polo Grounds, but in April of 1964 the Mets had a new home named after the man who got them there.

Bill Shea died Oct. 2, 1991. He was 84 and beloved.

“He was one of the nicest men I’ve ever met,” said long-time Met Rusty Staub.

Shea Stadium Marked The Beginning
By Noah C. Zuss
Shea Stadium, home of the Mets for over forty years will close forever at the end of this season. As the first ballpark built in the city of baseball since Yankee Stadium, construction of Shea was significant for many reasons-its closing will mark the end of an era that brought National League baseball back to New York after the Dodgers and Giants departed for sunny California.

The stadium is located in the geographic center of the City. Shea Stadium was built in Flushing-Meadows Park before the World’s Fair in 1964. From the beginning Shea has drawn large crowds.

In 1960, the National League agreed to grant an expansion franchise to the owners of the New York franchise in the unsuccessful Continental League, with a condition that a new stadium be built. Mayor Robert Wagner, Jr. personally wired every National League owner and promised that a new park would be built to house the new club.

Shea Stadium, located in the geographic and population center of city has drawn over 73 million fans and is approaching its last year of usage as the Mets are currently constructing a smaller and modern-baseball only venue in the parking lot. The new ballpark, expected to open in April, 2009, will be called Citi Field and is designed to resemble the Brooklyn Dodgers’ old home, Ebbets Field.

Never known as a tremendous ballpark by baseball purists, Shea was nonetheless loved by generations of fans. Because fans had waited for a home of their own, when the park opened in 1964 they came out in droves. Before Shea, the Mets played two years at the vast Polo Grounds, previously home of the New York Giants.

Home to historically bad teams throughout the sixties, Shea became the scene of jubilant celebration in 1969 when the “Miracle Mets” came back from a game one loss in the World Series to defeat Baltimore in five games and capture the Mets’ first title. Shea also hosted the All-Star game in 1964, the first and only in its history.

Built for a mere $25.5 million, the stadium marked a new beginning for the club that played its first two years in upper Manhattan. Originally the stadium was to be called Flushing Meadows Stadium” – similar to the name of the public park south of Shea – but a movement was launched to name it in honor of William A. Shea, the man who brought National League baseball back to New York.

Opened on April 17, 1964, the stadium is one of he oldest baseball parks in the National League.

The stadiums original design was to be expanded to 90,000 seats, by completely closing off the outfield. In 1964, a plan was advanced to add an enclosed dome and expand seating capacity to 71,000. This plan was scrapped after studies concluded that the stadium would be unable to support the weight of the dome because the area around the stadium is swampland.

At first, all of the seats were wooden, with each level having a different color. They were replaced with orange, red, green, and blue plastic seats before the 1980 baseball season.

The stadium is located in one of the noisiest areas of Queen near to LaGuardia Airport. Recently some flight patterns have been changed to alleviate the jet noise that plagued Shea for much of its history. In the past, interruptions for planes flying overhead were common at Shea, and the noise is sometimes so loud that radio and television broadcasts can’t be heard.

Some of Shea’s unique features are the big apple in the outfield-which pops up when a home run clears the fences, and the large scoreboard that features out-of-town scores and replays. Both are to be transferred to the new park.

The stadium has often been criticized by baseball traditionalists, even though it was changed to be a baseball-only stadium after the Jets left in 1983. This is because there was no permanent bleacher section, a favorite of fans, until early in the 21st century. This was in part because the park was originally designed to be fully enclosed. A small, movable bleacher section was installed in left field in the early eighties, but it was only made available to picnic groups.

Main criticisms of the old stadium include a steep upper deck, and field boxes that are too far from the field. The upper deck is one of the highest in the majors. The lower boxes are farther from the field than similar seats in other parks because they are still situated on the rails that moved the boxes into position for football fans to watch football games.

On the positive side, additional seats added over the years have significantly reduced the size of the foul territory, making Shea somewhat of a more friendly place to watch a game. Previously, Shea’s foul territory was one of the largest in the majors. Currently, 70 percent of the seats are between the foul poles; at one time, 75 percent of the seats were in foul territory. Also in the positive column in the park’s favor-Shea Stadium has never had an artificial turf playing surface, unlike many other ballparks Shea built in the same era.

Shea’s design was conceived by architectural firm Praeger-Kavanaugh-Waterbury, and constructed by Carlin-Crimmins in a joint venture with P.J. Carlin Construction Co. and Thomas Crimmins Contracting Co. The ballpark is owned by the City of New York.

1964: The First Season Of Memories
By Juliet Werner
Bob Mandt was working at a bank when Queens got a team.

“I had stopped rooting when the Dodgers left,” the Whitestone resident said. “I was really ticked off.”

A pal from his alma mater, St. Johns University, told him the new team was “looking for a couple of young guys” and convinced him to interview. When Mandt was offered a position, he immediately gave his two weeks notice and took the pay cut. He started as a clerk, became a ticket manager and then went on to work as Director of Operations and finally Vice President of Operations. Now, retired, he continues to serve as a consultant for the team.

“They can’t get rid of me,” he said

The Mets played at the Polo Grounds from 1962-1963.

Mandt was with the team when it played it’s first two seasons at the Polo Grounds in 1962 and 1963 and then set up shop at the new Queens stadium while it was still a work in progress.

“We moved in the dead of a very cold winter,” Mandt said. “It was a very cold and forbidding place. We had some pretty heavy snowstorms.”

He was joined only by the concessions staff and grounds crew.
“It was in the middle of nowhere,” he said, adding the financial, promotional and business departments were headquartered at a nearby airport hotel called the Traveler’s Inn.

“We were over at Shea and the two women wouldn’t use the chemical toilets,” he said. “We had to take to station wagons over [to the Inn.].”

When Shea opened on April 17, 1964 the Mets played the Pittsburgh Pirates before 48,736 fans.

“I don’t think the paint was dry opening day,” Mandt said. “I remember slapping some labels on the chairs where there weren’t numbers yet with masking tape and a magic marker. To save time there were plenty of seats that weren’t numbered.”

Concessions Director John Morley, who stayed onboard until Aramark took over, was also present on opening day.

“When we first opened the first week we really didn’t have water which is typical when a new facility opens,” Morley said. “By the time the team came back from the second road trip everything was pretty much in line.”

Morley said the original Shea menu was influenced by neighborhood flavors.

“We added some local things like knishes and other specialties that were not in ballparks prior to that,” Morley said.

He said one double header in 1964 that went until 11 p.m. nearly sent him over the edge.

“You try not to run out of hot dogs,” Morley said. “Although it was a Sunday…we were able to keep going all the way through.”

Shea also hosted an All-Star game in 1964, which provided Morley with an opportunity to feed non-Mets fans.

“When we first opened up we only had local beers like Rheingold and Schaefer,” he said. “They’re no longer in business. They really didn’t have the imported beers that you know about now. Now you have specialty stands with sandwiches and Mamas of Corona and a kosher stand,” he said.

Morley said the crowd’s changing demographics have affected concessions.

“It switched from a pretty masculine audience to a family audience. Especially at Shea and you have to be able to cater to a wider audience.”

The fan base may have diversified, but Mets games received a strong showing as soon as the stadium opened.

“We were a success financially,” Mandt said. “But on the field we only won a little over 50 games.”

That first season at Shea, under the management of Casey Stengel, the team went 53-109 and finished 10th in the National League. The team has improved with time; Mandt’s fondest memories are watching fans storm the field following the 1969 World Series and Mike Piazza scoring the winning run in the first game after Sept. 11. Mandt’s wife has expressed concern that her husband will be devastated once Shea is demolished.

“I love Shea Stadium,” Mandt confessed. “I liked it more than most people. For some reason the press were never enchanted with Shea Stadium.

Part of the problem was that it was a multi-use stadium. It was built for both the Jets and Mets. Whenever you build something for two sports something has to suffer a little bit.”

This is, of course, also the final season for Yankee Stadium, which opened in 1923.

“It has a longer tradition, a lot more wins and a lot more things to brag about,” Mandt said. “The Mets are not without their own history. If you’re a Mets fan you don’t really care about the Yankees’ history. You care about your own history.”