ST LOUIS HAWKS !!!!!!!!!! 1955----1968

St Louis Past Part Seven
For a young man who loved playing basketball. The fall of 1955 when the Hawks moved to St. Louis was the best of times.

To be able to witness number nine BOB PETTIT go from a good player to a great player was special. To see Cliff Hagan become one of the games great forwards at only six foot four inches tall. St. Louisian Easy Ed. Macauley came to the Hawks and took us from a good team to a championship team.

This was an era of twelve minute quarters, good defense, the advent of the time clock and teams routinely scored over a hundred points. The Hawks big rivalry at the time was the famed Boston Celtics. They had big Bill Russell, Bob Cousey, Bill Sharman, and were coached by the great Red Auerbach. Other great players of the time was Wilt Chamberlain,Oscar Robinson,Maurice Stokes, and Elgin Baylor.

I happen to have several game programs from that era that show a cost of .Thirty five cents. Ticket prices were $1.50 for general admission and $2.00 and $2.50 for reserve seating. I worked in the camera department of Sears making $1.00 per. hour but apparently that was enough money for two tickets. I was fortunate that my girl friend Nancy McCoy also enjoyed basketball. My memory is that we averaged seeing about six games a year.

Many of you who know me will agree that I am a little frugal.[ha ha] One of our favorite dates was going to a Hawks game on Sunday afternoon and then right afterwards a musical concert. We were fortunate enough to have seen Louis Armstrong, Lionel Hampton, and the Dukes of Dixieland for the price of a game ticket. In addition the Hawks would have doubleheader were you saw two games for the price of one. Some times the second game would be the Harlem globetrotter.

To demonstrate how lucky Nancy and I are we were there the night the Hawks beat the Celtics for the NBA championship on Saturday April 12 1958.[ we were not even engaged.} We witnessed Bob Pettit scored fifty points and nineteen out of the twenty one points the Hawks scored in the last quarter. Final score was Hawks 108, Celtics 107.

The Hawks played most of their games at Kiel Auditorium but they hosted the NBA all star game at the old arena/checkerdome. It was either the winter of 1958 or 1959 and again we were lucky and had two tickets. Really not bad for a guy making $1.00 an hour while attending college.

This posting was from my memory but if you have an interest in the Hawks there is a new book out titled Full Court by Greg Marecek. The next posting will be about a recent book signing event that I attended.