Archive for February 7th, 2010
The 7th Inning Stretch (Part 5)
So, just when did “Take Me Out To The Ballgame” first get sung during a seventh inning stretch? Well, first we have to look at where it came from. A fellow named Jack Norworth was on a train in 1908 heading to Manhattan when the idea for the song came to him, and he jotted it down. It was put to music, and has become the best known baseball song of all time.
No one is really sure when it first got sung at a ballgame, but Chicago White Sox announcer, Harry Caray had the fans sing it during the seventh inning stretch in 1971. The White Sox owner Bill Veeck, snuck a microphone into the booth & Harry Caray sang it loudly at Comiskey Park, without knowing everyone could hear his not-so-smooth voice. (Maybe that’s why fans were putting baseball gloves over their ears.) At any rate, it was a mainstay in Chicago after that. Caray switched to the Cubs and began to let celebrities lead the singing. The most memorable was Mike Ditka, but that’s another story…