After 71 years, brothers finally return to Wrigley Field to see Cubs in World Series
They had to wait more than seven decades, but Phil and Frank Nienstedt are overjoyed to finally be heading back to Wrigley Field for a Chicago Cubs World Series game.
On Friday night, a World Series baseball game will take place at Wrigley Field in Chicago. It's the first one in 71 years.
It's been a long drought for Cubs fans like Phil and Frank Nienstedt. The brothers went to a game the last time the Cubs made it to the World Series in 1945 — and they're going again tonight.
As It Happens host Carol Off spoke with Phil and Frank Nienstedt in Chicago before they headed out to Wrigley Field for the big game. Here is part of their conversation.
Carol Off: Phil, it was 71 years ago? It was just at the end of the war wasn't it — so what was it like?
Phil Nienstedt: The war had just ended. Of course, baseball was kind of a wartime sport there for a while. They played during the war years, but had a lot of men that weren't available for the draft, so it wasn't quite the same exciting game for a while. But in October of 1945, when the World Series came, there was all kinds of excitement. Maybe not quite the same as it is these days with all the hoopla and TV and everything, but it was exciting. They had a crowd of people out there, 40,000 people, and people yelling and screaming, just like they do nowadays at the big games. My brother and I were delighted to be out there. My dad got us tickets and we were out there at Wrigley Field enjoying the ball game.
CO: It was difficult to get those tickets — how did your Dad get them?
PN: That's a good story. The Game Six was the day before and it wasn't known that there would be a Game Seven until the sixth game was completed. The tickets went on sale at 8 a.m. right at the ballpark. He got there at 2 o'clock in the morning, on a real cold Chicago morning and stood in line for six hours waiting until the ticket office opened. Then he plunked down his seven dollars and twenty cents for each of the tickets that we got for the ball game. We kids had already cut school that day because we were anticipating going to the game and he came back and said, "Hey! I've got the tickets!" We were excited about it, of course, going to a ball game — the World Series. But had we known it would have been 71 years until we had a chance to do that again we probably would have been even more excited. Little did we know it would be the last chance for such a long time. For us, luckily, we're still alive to see it.
CO: Now of course, when the Cubs lost, people were consoling each other saying, "Ahh... there's always next year."
PN: That's what we said back in 1945. And we've been waiting and waiting, and waiting . . .
CO: And Frank, what's your prediction for the game tonight?
Frank Nienstedt: The Cubs have a good starting pitcher tonight — who is especially effective at home. We're looking favourably toward that. You never know. It's October, so people may get cold. Who knows if the pitcher is going to be thoroughly warmed up or not?
CO: We know the Cubs won the World Series in 1908 — is this the year the curse is broken and they do it again?
FN: The famous curse — the Billy Goat curse. We never know. At least they got this far, so we'll see.
For more on this story, listen to our full interview with Phil and Frank Nienstedt.