OT Casey Stengel's final game? (Call this "Casey's Last Stand")

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Posted By: T E

I've spent way too much time this morning trying to determine the answer to this question. I've got a ticket stub from Shea, July 24 1965 along with scorecard and a wraparound Old Timer's Day promo lineup. I was just about to list it on ebay when...

When I was looking at all this, it suddenly rang a bell-I remembered that Casey (who I met a couple of times, he was in person the same character he was in print) broke his hip after-hours either the night before or after Old Timer's Day and had to retire. I was surprised how difficult it was to verify via Google.

The scorecard is from the date, which I was able to verify, since it was filled in (Mets lost to Phils and Jim Bunning, who came eerily close to matching his Perfect Game against the Mets the year before, allowing only 3 baserunners) using Baseball Almanac online-what a great resource! Still, there was a great deal of misinformation I had to wade through to determine when exactly ole Casey broke his hip.

Out there in the internets, there is confusion about when Old Timer's Day fell that year. And there is confusion as to the exact date Casey retired. The first date I saw for his retirement was July 24, meaning he would have had to have broken his hip the night before. But the wrap-around Old Timer's program I have clearly gives the date as 7-24. There were many old-timers there, like Zach Wheat, whom Casey had actually played with, so I think what happened was Casey and the boys hit Toots Shor's place and made merry until the mean old sidewalk reached up and smacked Casey down.

Anyway, if you've made your way through all the above verbiage to this point, can you help a poor orphan along by sharing any knowledge you might have about said above events?
-Tom McM

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Posted By: T E

that if this is Casey's last game, it goes into my case with the 1964 Topps Casey Teaches card which he signed for me along with the bb he signed at HOF in (I think) 1969 and my vintage 1917 "Baseball Revue" photo of him playing for the Dodgers

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Posted By: Kevin Cummings

From ESPN Classic biography: "On July 24, 1965, Stengel suffered a fractured hip in a fall and put away his uniform. Five weeks later, the 75-year-old Stengel officially retired..."

From Wikipedia: "Stengel's retirement, announced on August 30, 1965, followed a fall at Shea Stadium, in which he broke his hip."

From Baseballlibrary.com: "In July of 1965, leaving a party at Toots Shor's, Stengel fell and broke his hip. It was impossible to manage anymore, and in August, out of the hospital and leaning on a cane, he made his formal farewells."

edited to add Toots Shor reference

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Posted By: jims

On Sat.July 24th the Mets lost to Phil 5 to 1. This was the last game that Casey ever managed. That night there was a party at Toot Shor's in Manhattan. Sometime after midnight Casey lost his balance, fell and hurt his left hip. The old timers game was scheduled for the 25th which he never attended. At a press conference on Aug 30th Casey officially retired. Info from STENGEL by Robert Creamer.

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Posted By: T E

that fills out what I know, except the Old Timer's Game itself, which was actually played on the 24th. I saw several references to the 25th on the good old internets, but uncorroborated. Here is the actual program for Old Timer's Game-note the date and note that for remaining games, the following day, the 25th is listed.






Here is the baseball Casey signed for me. It was either '68 or '69, the night before the induction ceremonies, at the party at the big inn up there. Note that Zach Wheat signed at the bottom of the panel, which is cool, considering he was a teamate of Casey's and was there on Old Timer's Day, his last day ever as manager, as it now appears. I don't know who the signature is below Casey's, could be Lloyd Waner.




Of course, there is something weird here-Jim Bunning's signature! What happened was, on induction day at the Hall of Fame, they used to play an inter-league exhibition game. That year, either 68 or 69, it was the Pirates from the NL.

I guess they didn't have a proper locker room at the stadium, because the ballplayers would dress at the hotel. I was walking through the HOF before the game, I turned a corner, and there was Jim Bunning. I just stuck out the ball, reflex action, and he signed.

Around the next corner I found another ballplayer-Carl Taylor. Again, I stuck out the ball and he signed. So on my ball with names like Frankie Frisch, Casey, Luke Appling, etc., is Carl Taylor. I guess I went 1 for 2 on my future Hall of Famers!

So on that panel you have Casey, Zach who played with Casey, and Bunning, who pitched against Casey in Casey's last game.

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Posted By: Al C.risafulli

Tom:

Sounds like that ticket stub would be an awesome thing to own.

July 30 was Casey's 75th birthday. From what I can gather, there was a birthday party for him on the evening of the 24th. As mentioned above, I suppose it was at Toots Shor's. I'm basing that assumption on this telegram from Bill Shea, which I thought you might be interested in seeing:



A few telegrams from the following day, July 25, sent to Casey wishing him a quick recovery:





Note Casey's handwriting on a few of the telegrams; he made notes like that on a lot of his correspondence, noting when he had responded to someone's letter, if he had sent anything along, or noting how many letters he had gotten on a particular issue. Casey seemed to be a pretty meticulous guy.

These telegrams would corroborate that his accident happened after midnight on the 24th/25th as noted above, probably after his birthday party.

He did continue to participate in Old Timer's games right up through the 1975 season.

-Al

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Posted By: T E

Great stuff. I have to check the Creamer book on the Old Timer's Game. If Creamer says the Old Timer's Game fell on the Sunday, he is wrong. Not the first time someone has made a mistake in print! (See Judith Miller-of course, her errors were of the intentional sort)

I hate to admit this, but I had two of these ticket stubs, and I sold one for a few bucks, not knowing the significance. Oops!

My dad took me into the Mets dugout in 1964. He was a newspaper guy. Casey was Casey. He loved playing the role with kids.

Next time I met him was, as I said, at the Hall of Fame. My dad and mom were there for the ceremonies. Dad was producing the first series of films for the HOF. I came upon Casey at the party at the hotel the night before. He was seated against a wall, surrounded by several gents, all, of course, drinking. I had this notebook with his baseball card in it and the above baseball. For some reason, I wanted him to sign the notebook twice, on the card and again below it.

One of his buddies said,"Casey, the kid wants ya to-"

Casey interrupted him. "I know what the kid wants! Come here, kid." And he signed everything the way I wanted.
-Tom