A History of Baltimore's Memorial Stadium Scoreboards

There have recently been some great photos that have been auctioned from The Baltimore Sun's archives which show the how Memorial Stadium's scoreboards have changed over the years. Looking through these photos gave me the idea of putting together a pictorial history:


This photo shows the new scoreboard as it looked in May of 1954, as the Orioles began their first season in Baltimore. According to the information on the back of the photo


at the time, this was the largest scoreboard in the world. Gunther Beer (a Baltimore brewery) was the sponsor, which is why the information reads "Gunther presents the world's largest scoreboard to citizens of Baltimore".

This news item also indicates that the board will be the world's largest:

Here is a shot showing how the scoreboard looked out in right field during a day game


and another shot taken at night:


The scoreboard originally had a bottle cap in the top left corner (which read "Whats the Good Word"), which was replaced by a bottle by the late 1950's as seen in these photos:

1959 Orioles Team Photo:


The 1959 NFL Championship Game (from a photo taken by my father in the upper deck):

Here is a closer cropped shot of the scoreboard from that picture:


It appears that for a period of time the message to the left of the bottle read "What A Wonderful Beer", but for another period of time it read "Happiest Hit in Beer"


with the word "hit" possibly used to distinguish a hit from an error.

In 1960, Hamm's Brewing Company bought Gunther Brewing Company, and the scoreboard reflected this change.

This photo from The Baltimore Sun from August 1964 shows the Hamm's advertisement on the scoreboard



which also made it on to this 1965 Topps ERA Leaders card in the background behind Dean Chance:


Thanks to Kevin from Orioles Card "O" the Day for pointing out that the scoreboard also appeared on Russ Synder's 1962 card in his post about the card which includes some great memories of Baltimore.

Here is the original negative for the 1962 card:


Hamm's then sold the Gunther brewery to Schaefer Beer, and the scoreboard advertising changed again in late 1964 as this October 1964 picture from a Colts game against the Packers shows:


Schaefer remained the sponsor on the scoreboard for the remainder of the 1960's




which means Schaefer was the sponsor for the 1966


and 1969 World Series



The Schaefer ad even made a sneaky appearance on Dave McNally's 1967 Topps card:

By 1970, the scoreboard needed to be replaced, and work started in 1970 for a new scoreboard in left field



As the information on the back of the photo indicates, the scoreboard was to make its debut on August 21, 1970.

While work was being done on the new board, the Schaefer ad was covered up with a message reading "Watch for completion of your new scoreboard now under construction in left field" as seen in this photo of Paul Blair from what appears to be Picture Day:


Fortunately, we have another shot from that same day of Merv Rettenmund which shows the new scoreboard:


Here is the one shot I've been able to find of both boards where the new board is still under construction:

With the change in the scoreboard, there came a change in sponsor, as National Beer took over.

An interesting side note is that the Orioles were owned by the President of the National Brewing Company Jerry Hoffberger starting in 1965 when he gained a controlling interest in the team, but another company's beer was prominently advertised on the scoreboard until 1970. I'm guessing that is because Schaefer owned Gunther who sponsored the original scoreboard, and since the city owned the stadium, and not the Orioles, perhaps there was nothing Hoffberger could do until a new scoreboard was built.

This is the scoreboard that would have been seen in the 1970 and 1971 World Series broadcasts from Baltimore:


as well as during Johnny Unitas' last few seasons on the Colts:


The new scoreboard was smaller than the original, and did not have room for things like out of town scores. It was a very bare bones scoreboard, which was mainly the result of cost concerns.

At the time, even though the Orioles had been in 2 World Series in a 4 year period, the club was still struggling to draw fans, so there wasn't a lot of money available for a fancy state of the art scoreboard.

However, in spite of that fact, it is the scoreboard I remember seeing every time I'd go to Memorial Stadium as a kid, and as such, still remains one of my favorite scoreboards as seeing pictures of it instantly takes me back to 33rd Street.

Fortunately, the entire scoreboard made an appearance on the 1973 Topps card of Tom Matchick:


As the 1970's went on, the National Beer sign on the top of the scoreboard changed to National Bohemian (Natty Boh)



This version of the scoreboard snuck into Mark Belanger's 1978 Topps card:


As the 1980's rolled around, Jerry Hoffberger no longer owned the team, and National Bohemian was replaced by Busch Beer:



One bit of interesting irony is that fact that the only Topps card I have found that has a shot of the Busch scoreboard is John Elway's 1984 Topps rookie card:


The irony, as any Baltimore Colts fan will tell you, is that Elway refused to play for the Colts who are the team that drafted him, but were forced to trade him as he threatened to play baseball for the Yankees rather than play for the Colts. Colt fans still wonder what might have been had Elway not maneuvered his way out of Baltimore. Even though he never played for the Colts, his rookie card shows him in Memorial Stadium.

Fortunately, Fleer produced a great shot of the scoreboard in their 1981 Football Team Action set:


In 1985, Memorial Stadium added a Diamond Vision board in right field where the original scoreboard used to be. This allowed fans to see video highlights.



Also interesting to note is that the scoreboard no longer had a beer sponsor, as Toyota now had its name at the top of the scoreboard. Budweiser was a beer sponsor on the Diamond Vision board.

1991 was the last season the Orioles played in Memorial Stadium before moving to Camden Yards,


and in 1992, the Diamond Vision board was removed from the stadium.

When the Cleveland Browns moved to Baltimore to become the Ravens, they played at Memorial Stadium for 2 seasons (1996 - 1997) and Budweiser was the sponsor on top of the scoreboard:



After the Ravens moved to their new stadium, Memorial Stadium was no longer being used, and fell into disrepair.



Unfortunately, the scoreboard, along with the rest of Memorial Stadium was eventually demolished in 2001.

Even though the scoreboard and the stadium are gone, seeing pictures of the various scoreboards takes me back to a time when the Colts still played in Baltimore, and the Orioles were one of the class organizations in baseball.

It Was 50 Years Ago Today....

This is the story of how the internet helped me solve the mystery surrounding this photo that my father took which I have determined was taken 50 years to this very day at the NFL Championship game on Sunday, December 27, 1959:

This past summer I was visiting my parents home when I came across a slide with the picture above. I could tell the slide was taken from a Baltimore Colts game at Memorial Stadium, but that was all I could determine.

Unfortunately, there was no notation on the slide as to the date to even give me an idea of what year it had been taken. Since my father passed a number of years ago, I wasn't able to ask him if he remembered what game the photo was from.

As my brother had recently bought a device to convert slides to digital images, he offered to have the slide converted, and later sent me the picture.

When I received the picture, I was able to make out that the Colts were playing the Giants based on the teams listed on the old Memorial Stadium scoreboard. While its not easy to make out all the other games that were listed on the scoreboard, it appeared that there were also the following games played that day:

Wash vs. NY (which wouldn’t make sense if the Colts were playing the Giants)

SF vs. Clev

CHIC vs. Cards

Phila vs. Pitt

Given I had a slate of games on the scoreboard, I figured there might be a chance for me to do some research to see if I could determine when this game was played, and also figure out why it appears the Giants were playing the Colts, but also listed as the Redskins opponent as well.

Since it looked like the picture would have been taken in the late 1950s / early 1960’s, I started researching the season schedules starting in 1957. After not finding the above combination of games played on the same date in 1957 or 1958, I found this for 1959:

Sunday, November 29, 1959:

WAS 14 at NYG 45

CHI 31 at CHC 7

PHI 0 at PIT 31

SFO 21 at CLE 20

LA 21 at BLC 35

The first 4 games match up exactly with the same matchups and home teams on the scoreboard. But the schedule indicates the Rams played at Baltimore on November 29, not the Giants. I kept looking at the scoreboard, and there is no mistaking that the Giants are the visiting team, so what was going on?

Going back to the 1959 schedule, I took a look at the remaining weeks on the schedule. The following week the Colts played an away game at SFO, and then the week after that was the last game of the regular season, which was also a road game played in LA.

Back in those days there were no playoffs, so the final game played in the 1959 season was the Giants vs. the Colts for the NFL Championship in Baltimore on December 27, in a rematch from the previous season’s Championship game (which would come to be known as The Greatest Game Ever Played).

Could it be that the out of town games from the last regular season home game were simply left up on the scoreboard for a month and not taken down for the Championship game?

That seemed like a plausible theory, but I wanted proof, so I took one again to the internet and did an image search for the 1959 NFL Championship game, and look what I found:

I couldn’t have asked for a better photo! In this picture, you can clearly see the Giants vs the Colts at the top of the scoreboard, along with those regular season games (Wash vs. NY, CHIC vs. Cards, Phila vs Pitt) from November 29.

Finding this photo gave me proof that the slide I found was a picture my father took 50 years ago today at the 1959 NFL Championship Game, which the Colts ultimately won 31 - 16.

Unfortunately this was the only slide I found from the game, and its actually taken during the pregame ceremonies with the Baltimore Colts Marching Band. Here is a photo from a 1963 Colts program giving a better view of the Band in a formation very similar to my father's picture:

On a side note, speaking of the Baltimore Colts Marching Band, the ESPN 30 for 30 series did a great documentary on the Band directed by Barry Levinson called The Band That Wouldn’t Die which told the story of how they continued to perform after the team snuck out of Baltimore and ultimately became the Ravens Marching Band. I highly recommend the film if you get the chance to see it.

In searching for pictures from the 1959 NFL Championship game, I didn't find any color pictures as everything was B&W.

Even though my father's photo doesn't contain any game action itself, at least at this point, it seems to be the only color picture available from the game.

I'm very glad my father had his camera with him that day to take this picture as it provides a great look at how Memorial Stadium looked at that time as well as provides a glimpse at how simple the pregame ceremony for the Championship game was like then compared to what its become today:

My how times have changed!


UPDATE: October 2011

Thanks to John for sending me this picture which shows the scene at the end of the 1959 NFL Championship Game with the fans on the field celebrating the Colts victory:


This picture comes from this photo gallery from the book The Cowgirl and The Colts by Paul J Tavers.

It provides a nice "after" shot from the game to go along with the "before" shot that my father took before the start of the game.