August 14, 2015 (Friday)
When it was first built, Minute Maid Park was known as Enron Field. But even before that, the ball park was filled with trains, tracks and palatial rooms known as Union Station, or Union Depot. Part of the big building survives in the baseball park’s left field.
There once was a trolley known as the Interurban that shuttled passengers back and forth between Houston and Galveston from 1911 through 1936. It was an electric railway. By the time my cousin, Clinton Attaway, and I were old enough to go to Galveston by ourselves to spend a day, about 1946, the Interurban had been replaced by a regular passenger train that we boarded at the Union Station. Tickets were cheap and we enjoyed those trips. When we arrived in Galveston at the beautiful Santa Fe Union Station, we walked and ran miles to the beach. Those were the days.
I’ve never been to Minute Maid Park, but I’m sure I would be reminded of those Galveston trips via train from Union Station, part of which is fully visible out there in left field.
The Houston Astros Baseball Team occupied the Astrodome for many years, and players found home runs difficult in that massive room. So when the team had a new stadium built, it was intentionally designed to allow more home runs. Well and good, I would say. Home runs are exciting, and we like that with our hot dogs and peanuts.
Here’s to the Union Station and Minute Maid Park, now nestled against a busy Houston Freeway amidst some of the oldest real estate in downtown Houston, no longer occupied by the original settlements on those old streets.
On Crawford Street at Texas Avenue
Houston, Texas
and..
If you were born August 14, 1945, you are 70 years old today. You were born on the day that ended World War 2.
