Читать книгу Bad Boys, Bad Times. The Cleveland Indians and Baseball in the Prewar Years, 1937–1941 онлайн

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There was money to earn even after the game finished, in the “blow-off sales,” where vendors lowered their prices and sold items to fans needing food for the drive home. Men on their way back to the office might want a hot dog and a cold beer to get them through the overtime hours. There were many ways to make a buck.

The crowd assembled on April 19 added up to 31,600. It was a new record for the Cleveland Indians, yet still left almost two-thirds of the stadium seats empty. Major League attendance for opening day, including Cleveland–St. Louis, reached 250,000, a robust start for the new season. Owners looked ahead to a money-making summer. They had scrimped and saved for quite some time, and prospects were now bright for a continued stretch of profitability. The red lines in the company books were beginning to give way to black ones, much to the relief of the clubs that had struggled mightily throughout the Depression of the 1930s. The team owners could now sit back in their private boxes, shaking hands and counting the dollars about to be added to their savings accounts. Even Judge Landis might be seen cracking a small grin. Though probably not.