Mr. Commissioner, will you officially open the baseball museum?
Ladies and gentlemen, I now declare the National Baseball Museum
and the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperston, New York,
the birthplace of baseball, open.
May it forever stand as a symbol of clean play and good sportsmanship.
Ladies and gentlemen, the place of privilege of being the first
to walk out of the Hall of Museum of Baseball is Connie Mack,
and now he's in front of the microphone.
I feel greatly honored in being here today
where our first national game was started by Abner Doubleday.
And now the twelve players in the Baseball Hall of Fame,
elected by the Baseball Writers Association,
Wee Willie Keeler, he hit him where he ate,
Christy Mathewson, baseball's big six, master of the fadeaway
and famous pitcher for the Giants,
Honus Wagner, the flying Dutchman,
the greatest shortstop in the game's history.
Ladies and gentlemen, I was born in 1874.
This organization started in 1876.
And when I was just a kid, I said, I hope someday I'll be up there playing in this league.
And by chance I did.
Connie Mack, the gentleman that preceded me here at the mic,
I remember walking 14 miles just to see him play ball for Pittsburgh.
However, I want to thank you for being able to come here today.
The next memorial to come before the mic is Tris Speaker,
greatest defensive player of all time and a great hitter.
Thank you, Shelley, and I'm very happy indeed to have been chosen by the sports writers
as a member of this great hall of fame. Thank you.
Nap Lajoie, baseball's greatest second baseman and a model of grace.
Ladies and gentlemen, I'm very glad to be here today and to meet all the old timers.
The next is Cy Young, and we must go into superlatives on Cy Young,
for he is the only pitcher who has ever won 500 baseball games.
Nothing pleases me better than to be about and see and know
that the young generation today is following our footsteps.
This is about the proudest day of my life.
Why, I'd be glad to be the bat boy for such a team as this.
Thank you very much.
In my dreams I often think what I could do today with a team like they were,
if they could be now what they were then.
I would have no mistakes to be worrying about,
or when they hit those line drives off me I would have no trouble wondering who was going to get them.
I hope someday that some of the young fellows that are coming into the game
will know how it feels to be picked on the hall of fame.
I know the old boys back in there, we were just talking it over.
Some had been here long before my time.
They got on it and I worked hard and I got on it.
And I hope that the coming generation of the young boys today,
that they'll work hard and also be on it.
As my old friend Cy Young says, I hope it goes another hundred years
and the next hundred years will be the greatest.
You know, it seems like an anniversary for me too and I'm surely glad
it's a pleasure for me to come up here and be picked also on the hall of fame.