Mantle, DiMaggio among Yankees who played in Tucson in 1951

Tucson mayor J.O. Niemann stood on a platform at Armory Park on an early March afternoon in 1951, celebrating the Cleveland Indians arrival for the spring training baseball season.

It was the Indians’ fifth season in Tucson and the occasion was marked by a downtown parade in which all of the Indians players and coaches rode to Armory Park in shiny new convertibles.

Bands from Davis-Monthan Air Force Base and Amphitheater High School played; hundreds of Tucsonans listened to speeches by Indians executives. After that, the mayor thanked all for attending and added this punch-line:

“Next Saturday afternoon at Randolph Park, the Indians will open the season by playing the New York Yankees.”

According to newspaper reports, the ovation was so loud it all but shook oranges off the trees at Armory Park.

The Yankees of the ’50s were the biggest name in American sports. They had never played a spring training game west of Texas, but in 1951 New York owner Del Webb, who was developing his Sun City empire in Phoenix, successfully persuaded New York Giants owner Horace Stoneham to swap spring training facilities for one year.

The Giants went to Florida; the Yankees to Phoenix.

That meant the Yankees would play in Tucson on March 10 and March 12, and four days before the March 10 game, a Saturday, all tickets were sold. A record crowd of 5,380 squeezed into Randolph Park and fans weren’t disappointed.

The Yankees brought all of their big names: Joe DiMaggio, Phil Rizzuto, Yogi Berra and 19-year-old rookie Mickey Mantle, playing his first game in a Yankees uniform. The only missing piece was Whitey Ford, who spent the 1951 season in the Army.

When the sellout crowd settled into the stadium that afternoon, they couldn’t have imagined that 15 future Hall of Famers were in the ballpark.

The Yankees had six: Mantle, DiMaggio, Rizzuto, Berra, outfielder Johnny Mize and manager Casey Stengel.

But incredibly, it was the Indians, favored to win the 1951 American League championship, who had the most (nine) future Hall of Famers in their dugout.

Bill Veeck, the owner.

Hank Greenberg, the GM.

Al Lopez, the manager.

Pitcher Bob Feller.

Pitching coach Red Ruffing.

Hitting coach Al Simmons.

Outfielder Larry Doby.

Pitcher Early Wynn.

Pitcher Bob Lemon.

Through six decades of spring training baseball here, it was surely the largest gathering of Hall of Famers in Tucson history.

The Yankees won the Saturday afternoon opener, 6-5 in 12 innings. Mantle, a 19-year-old rookie, had three hits. DiMaggio lined out to shortstop as a pinch-hitter.

A day later, the teams drove to Phoenix as the Yankees made their debut in downtown Phoenix before a crowd of 7,398. Then the teams returned to Tucson for a Monday afternoon game, in which Mantle again got three hits; the Yankees won 10-8 in 10 innings. DiMaggio, who was playing his final season for the Yankees, walked in a pinch-hitting appearance. Only 2,333 attended Monday’s game.

Even though the Yankees and Indians were the only MLB spring training teams based in Arizona in 1951, they would not meet again in Tucson. Immediately after the March 12 game at Randolph Park, the Yankees and Indians began an 11-game, 12-day swing through Los Angeles, San Francisco, Sacramento and Oakland, mostly against Pacific Coast League teams.

Randolph Park was unoccupied for 15 days.

A year later, the Yankees returned to Florida and did not play another game in Arizona until the 2001 World Series in downtown Phoenix.

Where are they now: The Indians continued staging spring training in Tucson until 1992. Now they train at Goodyear Ballpark outside Phoenix, sharing the facility with the Cincinnati Reds.

How they did it: The Indians openly discussed leaving Tucson as a spring training site as early as 1951. Veeck told the Star “Will we be back? Why, we haven’t even been invited. We’ll see what our options are.”

Upon reading Veeck’s comments, Tucson real estate developer Roy Drachman, who was a key part of bringing spring training to Tucson, went into his business mode:

“We prefer to have Cleveland train here,” he said. “But if the Indians can’t see their way to stay, we want to know by April 1. We’ll try to get someone else to train here. From the results that Cleveland has gotten from spring training here, we have the proof necessary to interest other major league teams in coming to Tucson.”