CLEVELAND — If ever there was a "field of dreams," League Park in Cleveland is it. Not built by a dreamer, but celebrated by one who is of the present time, but often looking into the long-ago past.
To anyone who will listen, author and baseball historian Scott Longert will look into the generations and tells of what he sees.
"Bill Wamby was right there. Ray Chapman was there. Ray Caldwell was on the mound," Longert says as we stand in the spot where Cleveland Indians players of long, long ago once stood too.
Longert has one foot in the present day and the other in 1919 when perhaps the most bizarre event of Major League Baseball occurred.
We are at League Park at the crossroads of Lexington Avenue and East 66th Street, once home of the Cleveland Indians.
"The clouds started rolling in. You could hear some thunder in the distance," said Longert, setting the scene.
It is the ninth inning. The Indians are ahead. The umpires are trying to squeeze in the game to its last out before any heavy rainfall.
The storm strengthens over Lake Erie and then heads inland, bringing with it a startling snap crack of lightning.
"Everybody saw it. There was panic. People ran out of the stadium. The guys in the infield and the outfield, they felt the electricity," Longert shared.
Taking the lightning strike was pitcher Ray Caldwell, just as the big fastballer was in his windup.
"And boom! He was down. Flat on his back. All the guys in the infield felt the charge go through their spikes," Longert added.
Fear swept through League Park. Ray Caldwell was stretched out on the mound.
Unconscious. Some remember his uniform smoldering. Emotionally stunned, the stadium held its breath.
And then came what can only be called a miracle.
"However in two or three minutes, he woke up and he was in a sitting position. Then he stood up," Longert said.
Applause rippled through the ballpark. "HE'S ALIVE," came shouts from throughout League Park.
His teammates tried to walk him to the clubhouse.
But Caldwell barked "Heck no!" or something like that.
"He said, 'Gimme the ball and point me to the direction of home plate.'"
In today's world, a game would not resume with lightning in the area and certainly not for a player who had been struck by lightning. But in 1919, the game went on.
So did Ray Caldwell, who went all nine innings. And he won.
"He walked back to the dugout. A victim of lightning," Longert told us. "He didn't want to go to the hospital."
Strangely the story drew only a mention in the newspapers.
But more than a hundred years later, the spot where lightning struck is still a pitcher's mound.
The Caldwell struck by lightning story haunts Longert. He can't let it go. Because when Longert -- the dreamer -- walks the field, he is back in time.
"It's just a place of honor to set foot on that field where the greatest players of all time set foot there."
Ray Caldwell remained with the Cleveland Indians until 1922 and was also part of the World Series-winning roster in 1920.
Scott Longert has a new book coming out next month entitled "Love and Loss: The Short Life of Ray Chapman."
The Baseball Heritage Museum at League Park also has much more on Chapman's story, as well as other pivotal moments in the sport, and you can visit Wednesdays through Sundays from 9 a.m.-3 p.m.
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