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Here, my son and I pose in front of the Hall of Fame plaque for Nolan Ryan.  Even though he's not yet 18-months old, the little man has the urge to throw.  Anything that he has in his hand - a ball, a block, his sippy-cup, a shoe, you name it - within seconds is usually sent flying.  And, as someone who's been on the receiving end of some of these deliveries, I can testify that the boy has a cannon-in-training for an arm.  I'm marking 2044 for the year that he breaks Ryan's strikeout record.

Above is a ball, 147-years-old (almost to the day we saw it) from one of the first series of baseball games where admission was charged.  

For days before our trip, we told my 3-year-old daughter where we were going and what we were going to see.  After a while, if you asked her where she was going and what she was going to do, she would say that we were "going to a cooper's town" to see "a ball of fame."  When I saw this ball from 1858, I thought to myself "She was right!"

This is a LeRoy Neiman painting in the Hall's gallery - entitled "Hall of Famer."  If I recall correctly, it was dated 1996.  When I saw it live in the Hall, I swore to my wife that it was Paul O'Neill.  But, now, looking at the photo, while the swing is somewhat-O'Neill-like, I'm no longer convinced.

Above, my daughter checks out some stuff on Carl Hubbell.  Every dad's nightmare, seeing your daughter drawn to a screwball guy.  Just kidding Carl.

The kids check out a Ty Cobb exhibit.  Is it just me, or, do Derek Jeter and Cobb sorta/kinda have the same eyes?

My kids (above) checking out a photo of the Polo Grounds during the 1951 play-in series.  The "Staten Island Yankees" hat is my daughter - wearing her cap backwards.  As much as my son seemed interested in that picture, it was small change compared to seeing the Philly Phanatic, below:

Speaking of "fanatics," the Hall had an interesting exhibit honoring some legendary fans.  Here is my favorite from that collection:

Now, that's a baseball fan.

This next exhibit was also very interesting to me:

It's Shoeless Joe Jackson's glove and jersey.  I guess you can ban the man, but, his stuff is still O.K. to look at.  I remembered thinking the same thing in 2003 when we were at the Hall and I saw all the Pete Rose items on display.  Speaking of White Sox stuff, when I saw the huge "wheel" (below) from the scoreboard at the "old" Comiskey Park, all I could think of was "Wow, how to you ship something like that?  Just bring it to the UPS Store or something?"  If true, that would have been some What Can Brown Do For You commercial.

Below is a memo from (then) Baseball Operations E.V.P Sandy Alderson  - who's real name, according to the memo, is "Richard L. Alderson."  I wonder where he got "Sandy" from?  Anyway, the Hall has a bunch of these memos on display.  This one concerns players standing for the National Anthem before games.  

Undoubtedly, "suggestion" # 3 above is the key point of the memo:

Speaking of it's stupid to have rules that no one pays attention to, I thought this display at the Hall was amusing.  It's the "clubhouse poster" policy on how to wear a uniform.  As you can tell, clearly it is current as it uses the Washington Nationals as the example and 2005 is their first year of existence:

The "Jersey" and "Pants" instructions are as follows:

Like I said: Why bother having a rule if it's painfully obvious that it's is never going to be enforced? Has anyone ever seen the way Manny Ramirez currently wears his uniform?  Or, Ronnie Belliard?  And, there are many others out there "doing their own thing" with their uniforms. 

In any event, moving on to more fun pictures, below are me and the kids goofing around on the statues of Johnny Podres and Roy Campanella, that are found outside the Hall.  These were taken during the afternoon of the day before we went into the Hall:

To see more photos from our trip, click here.