Hank Aaron

Baseball legend Hank Aaron died today at age 86. He was certainly one of my all time favorite baseball players. My brother Tom and I saw him many times down at Connie Mack Stadium throughout the sixties starting during the1960 season. I would see him play a few more times in the mid seventies. It was always a treat and a reason to go down to the ballpark when Hank Aaron and the Braves were in town.

There were several players that Tom and I would make the effort to get down to ballpark to see when we were kids that included Hank Aaron, Willie Mays, Stan Musial, Bob Gibson and Sandy Koufax. We started out going to games with our Uncle Tom, our grandmother's brother, who lived around the corner from us and would take us down to games on the trolley. As we got to be pre-teens and early teens we would go down to games by ourselves and sit in the outfield bleachers. Tom got into all the baseball stats back then and kept at it his entire life.

Becky and I went to the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown a few years ago. I had been there before but it was Becky's first time. We were both very impressed with the special Hank Aaron room.

The last time I saw Hammerin' Hank was play 1976 at Veterans Stadium. R.I.P.