SOLDIER'S FIELD, EAST DOUGLAS MASS

THE CURSE OF THE BAMBINO, PART 2 ...
A POWERFUL RED SOX TEAM FAILS
IN THE WORLD SERIES ...

September 26, 1946 ... No game scheduled ... In a day of gift giving, the Yankees outslugged the Red Sox, 8-7 in an exhibition game in East Douglas.  In front of 12,000 fans, nearly quadruple the local population, at Soldiers Field,  the teams had been brought in by woolen mill magnate Winfield A. Schuster, of the Hayward-Schuster mills, as a welcome home for the troops returning from World War II and as a celebration of the town's bicentennial anniversary.

Joe Cronin was given a car, while the players were given jackets.  Umpire Bill Summers from nearby Uxbridge, received a new washing machine, while Joe DiMaggio, Joe Gordon, Bobby Doerr and Ted Williams were given hunting rifles.

After Ted Williams had batted twice, he went up to the broadcast booth and called the fourth inning.  During his tenure at the mike, the Sox scored five runs.

Douglas resident, Ann Resan recounted a story about her friend Dolores Colonero, who lived next to the baseball field and whose father wanted to offer Yankees' centerfielder Joe DiMaggio a glass of wine as a form of good Italian hospitality. She said DiMaggio told her father, “Oh no, Mr. Colonero, I don't drink when I play.”