Prints

Over the past two years or so, I’ve bought a number of negatives showing White Sox players from the 1940s.  By force of will, I finally made myself find a photo lab that can actually develop negatives.  It was definitely worth the effort.

 

All the film was shot at Comiskey Park between 1942-48.  Some of the pictures show players doing stuff well before game time; other shots were taken during the course of games.  For whatever reason, it’s mostly pitchers and catchers.  Trust me, judging from the look on his face (and the cigarette in his mouth), catcher Tom Turner was not somebody you messed around with.

 

To look at these photographs is to realize what was lost with the razing of Comiskey Park.  There’s no escaping those arches that framed the park, and why would you want to?  Pitcher Johnny Rigney squats in the outfield grass, waiting for somebody to throw him a ball; behind Rigney is the outfield wall, “352” painted next to the foul line that extends up the left field wall.  Behind the grandstand seats are those arches.

 

Thurman Tucker is in the cage taking BP, against a backdrop of arches.  Catcher George Dickey (brother of Bill) looks into the camera from his spot in the bullpen down the left field line, arches in the background.  Guy Curtright takes a practice swing for the camera, arches off in the distance.

 

My favorite photo shows Sox catcher Ralph Weigel at bat during a day game, the sun catching the back half of his profile (the left side) during a swing.  The image has an unmistakable Joe DiMaggio feel to it.  By accident or on purpose, the photographer caught Weigel doing his version of The Swing, made famous by DiMaggio.  Arms and legs in motion, head steady—you can find any number of pictures that capture DiMaggio working his right-handed magic.

 

Ralph Weigel was a career .230 hitter the three years he spent in the major leagues; 1948 was his lone season on the South Side, where he hit .233.  Weigel never homered in the big leagues, though he did have seven doubles and three triples in ’48.  Maybe this pictures is from the game he went three-for-four with a double against the Red Sox at home in June or the double and triple he had in a September game against the Browns.  That’s the one I’ll go with.

 

Such a swing, those arches.