Jerry Summers
While his creation on East 3rd Street in Choo Choo City lies like a dying beached whale within the reach of the medical mogul group eagerly waiting for the National Historical Registry entity to take its last breath, The “Barnum of the Bushes” is watching and chuckling.
After its creation and construction in 1930, Engel Stadium with a 12,000 seating capacity has had many ups and downs. But the marketing skills of Joe Engel, a supportive public before TV, and many wild and crazy events that offered a mostly poor public an opportunity to win prizes or much needed cash money, kept the facility open for baseball.
The “Knothole Gang” for youngsters, based on passing grades in school and certification of Sunday school attendance as the only requirements for free admission to Lookouts games, created a community oriented organization.
After Engel’s passing, efforts to keep the team in Gig City by Woody Reid, Jim Crittenden and Arvin Reingold kept baseball alive in the stadium.
Unsuccessful pleas were made by the Engel Foundation, Dr. Basketball (GH) (sports talk creator with his brother the “Music Man”, JH) and others to get local politicians to renovate the historic venue where Babe Ruth, Willie Mays and Harmon Killebrew, etc. played (the list is endless) at a cost that is minuscule compared to what the poor billionaires and developers want to impose on the taxpaying public for the next 20 to 30 years.
Minor League franchise owner Frank Burke stepped up to the plate and revived baseball to the point of building the present stadium on the former football stadium site (Hawk Hill) of the razed Kirkman Vocational High School.
(Being for or against the baseball stadium is beyond the scope of this article. The 2,500 nonprofits, the numerous foundations and the absentee billionaire renters of the club may already have a no additional taxpayer cost-overrun solution before this article is published.)
PS- Joe Engel may be enjoying the intrigue?
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You can reach Jerry Summers at jsummers@summersfirm.com