The Indians got a special guest for their 1939 season opener, as the national anthem was sung by Judy Garland, an accomplished stage and screen star at 16 — with even greater stardom to come soon.
Garland (born Frances Gumm) was part of a vaudeville family, and she broke into movies as a teen, finding fame as the co-star of Mickey Rooney in the Andy Hardy movies. Filming had been completed for The Wizard of Oz earlier in 1939, and Garland was in Cleveland for a two-week engagement at Loew’s State Theatre in what’s now Playhouse Square: the first stage show at the theater in three years.
Her first show was on a Friday evening, April 21. That afternoon was also the Indians’ opener against the Detroit Tigers. It was scheduled to be the home opener, but the entire three-game series that would have begun the series in St. Louis was washed out.
Indeed, cold temperatures with a hint of rain were predicted at the lakefront. “Sensible people would go in out of the rain,” wrote Roelif Loveland in the next day’s The Plain Dealer. “Sensible people would go in out of the cold.” But a hale, hearty 23,957 showed up in what Loveland said was more like football weather.
Cleveland Mayor Harold Burton threw out the ceremonial first pitch, bouncing one in the dirt, and Garland, the guest of team owner Alva Bradley, sang “The Star-Spangled Banner” as the flag was raised in the outfield. The Indians then tamed the Tigers, 5-1, behind a stellar pitching performance from Bob Feller, the first of his seven Opening Day starts — still a team record.
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