Why Are People Leaving Baseballs On This SE MN Gravestone?
A baseball, it's an odd thing to be left behind in a graveyard. But that's what people do at the grave of Archibald Graham in Rochester. Does that name sound familiar to you? If not how about the name Moonlight Graham, from the 1989 film Field of Dreams? It's been 30 years since the movie came out, but the movie clearly touched some people the right way as they solemnly leave baseballs behind.
Pretty cool right? For those who don't know the story of Doc Graham he was born out East in North Carolina and after playing in exactly one game in right field for the New York Giants in 1905 [just over 115 years ago as the game was played on June 29], moved to Chisolm Minnesota to be a doctor after answering an ad in a newspaper. He filled the role of town
You can read his whole life story here.
So the next time you are in the Med City and see someone enter a graveyard with a baseball, you'll at least have an idea of who they might be going to pay their respects to.
FUN FACT: NBC News ran a story of Archibald Graham some number of years ago, and one nugget that I never had any idea about was that the field in which Graham got to play in his one Major League game in still has a portion of it standing. The ballpark was in Brooklyn and named Washington Park. The still standing wall makes it the oldest ballpark remnant in America.
