Jack In The Box: Shirley Clements Mewborn Field Is Paradise, Found Anew.
March 10, 2009
Location: 935 Fowler Street, Atlanta, GA 30332
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By Jack Wilkinson
On the Flats, on the corner of 8th and Fowler, where they once paved
paradise and put up a parking lot, that mistake was rectified Tuesday.
Rectified in spades, and shades of Camden Yards, Wrigley and Fenway.
"It made me feel," Whitney Haller said, "like it was the World Series."
On a hillock that was once a playing field at old O'Keefe High, later
a Georgia Tech intramural and club sports field, and which most
recently served as prime parking for Tech basketball games, that lot
is going, going, gone. In its place stands a brand-new, fast-pitch
palace that's already softball paradise.
"A wonderful facility," gushed Dr. Gary Schuster, Tech's interim
president, as he commenced the ribbon-cutting ceremony to open Shirley
Clements Mewborn Field.
"Wow! What a facility!" marveled Duke Mewborn, whose late wife,
Shirley, a trailblazing Tech female student in the early 1950s, was
the principal donor for the $5 million stadium that bears her name.
"Shirley would be so proud," Duke told the crowd of his wife, who
died in 2003. "Isn't it beautiful?" he said, gesturing at the stands.
And his voice cracked with emotion.
"I think this park epitomizes a family atmosphere, and a lot of what
Georgia Tech is about," said Theresa Wenzel, Tech's associate
athletics director/senior women's administrator. "A certain sense of
elegance and sophistication." She paused. She smiled. "If you can
define a softball field like that."
You can, and you should. At least with this softball field. Sharon
Perkins put it all -- the gem of a ballpark, the opening, the setting,
her 100th victory at Tech...and then her 101st -- succinctly, and
perfectly.
"It was neat," said the Jackets' third-year head coach, whose team
swept a doubleheader from Tennessee-Martin: 2-1 in the opener on
Kristen Adkins' two-run home run -- her first career homer --, then 7-5
in the late-afternoon nightcap in which Adkins pitched five innings
and got the win while also going 3-for-3 with three RBI.
Everyone loves everything. The stadium -- capacity 1,500 -- itself. The
setting, nestled on the campus in the shadow of the O'Keefe building.
The skyline of downtown Atlanta: the Bank of America towering high
above and beyond center field; the shiny new glass towers of Midtown
rising behind the Jackets' third-base home dugout. The large and
enthusiastic crowd included members of the Tech band (three tubas
strong), and many athletes from several other sports who just dropped
in to see what condition this new ballpark was in.
That condition? Perfect, like Opening Day itself. First pitch: 1:55
p.m. Game-time temperature: 82 degrees, with winds blowing from right
field to left (indeed, all four homers Tuesday were hit to left
field). Five-year forecast: Bright beyond belief.
Some dimensions: It's 190 feet (the minimum NCAA distance) down the
lines, 220 to straightaway center, and millions of miles from
yesteryear. From nowhere, which is essentially where the Jackets used
to play: in a misbegotten playing field on 14th St., back behind a
local TV station. Which was not exactly what Whitney Haller signed on
for when she graduated from Harrison High and chose to come to Tech.
She remembered the promises, the assurances from the previous coaching
staff that Tech would have its own on-campus facility. "The promises
soon turned into chances of `Next year, next year,'" Haller told the
crowd, speaking on behalf of her teammates in the pre-game ceremony.
"The promises have now become a reality -- and what a reality.
"It is only fitting that a field this grand is dedicated to a woman
that's equally as incredible," said Haller, a three-time All-ACC first
baseman who was recently awarded an ACC post-graduate scholarship.
"Thank you, Shirley, for paving the way for women at Tech. Thank you,
administration, for this amazing facility. And thank you, fans, for
your constant support."
The very best ballparks are always downtown parks. Think Wrigley.
Think Fenway. Think Camden Yards. Now, when you think of Mewborn
Field, think Camden -- but instead of the warehouse building beyond
Baltimore's right field wall, picture O'Keefe beyond the home
run-friendly left field wall at Tech. No batter has shattered a window
in O'Keefe. Not yet, anyway.
"The pot's still open for the first window that's gonna get broken out
there," said Jason McFadden, the project manager for Barton Malow
Company, which built Mewborn Field. He smiled. You would, too, if
you'd built this ballpark and had such a care-free debut.
"It's good. The sound system seems to be well-received," McFadden
said. "The other team was awed when they walked in. I was here at 10
o'clock the other night, and I fired up the lights to get some
pictures. If I'm the visiting team, I'm gonna be looking at the
Midtown skyline a lot from the dugout."
Times change, don't they? "It was about a little over a year ago that
you could've parked a car where I'm standing," Tech athletic director
Dan Radakovich told the crowd during the opening ceremonies, standing
just in from of the pitching rubber. From the start, Tech wanted to
build an on-campus ballpark, to enhance campus life and softball's
winning percentage.
"It was important for us to have a softball facility in the same
ballpark as our baseball stadium," Radakovich said of Russ Chandler
Stadium, where Tech's baseball team pounded Mercer late Tuesday
afternoon. "Title IX dictated it. Common sense dictated it."
Shirley Mewborn made it all possible. "She'd have been so proud of
this," Duke said of his late wife, who'd have turned 75 next week.
They were married for 46 years. "She was big on sports. And to have
this in her honor? Oh, unbelievable. And how first-class it is."
Like the lady herself. "When Shirley was here, Tech only had five
women," Mewborn said. After attending Western Carolina Teachers
College as a freshman, Shirley Clements' scholarship was for one year.
According to her husband, "She came back to Atlanta and had a cousin
here who told her, "'Hey, Tech is accepting women.'"
Despite having to take some freshman-level courses as a sophomore,
Clements graduated from Tech in three years with a B.S. in electrical
engineering.
"In high school, she was an avid basketball player," Mewborn said of
his late wife, who grew up in Rochelle, Ga., about 30 miles east of
Cordele. "But tennis was her hobby. Fishing and tennis. Shirley loved
fishing, too. She went to Alaska with me two times. She always caught
the biggest fish."
They met, of course, where many Tech undergraduates spend most of
their time: In the library. "I was working in the library, and Shirley
needed some spending money," said Mewborn, who entered Tech in 1952.
"So she was working in the library, too."
They wooed and wed, graduated and went to work. Shirley was very
successful in the outside world, the business world. She was also
incredibly generous to her alma mater, having previously endowed an
athletic scholarship.
And now this. "Fantastic," Duke said, looking out over the diamond.
"And the view of it. Look at that view." He gazed toward downtown,
under a sky of blue, criss-crossed by white contrails from airplanes
high above.
"To me, there's nothing more magical than going to a football game at
Grant Field," Mewborn said. "The view is fantastic, especially at
night. And now you can see it here."
The skyline of Atlanta. The breathtaking backdrop for Georgia Tech
women's softball, 56 years after Shirley Clements first matriculated
at Tech.
"Oh, it's awesome," said Cris Perkins, whose wife won her first two
softball games in her palatial new home Tuesday. "We've been at most
of the [top] softball stadiums, and this is right up there. It's kinda
weird, though, being yours."
Arizona first set the standard. Fresno State sunk a ton of money into
its softball facility. The SEC schools jumped on-board, big-time. So
did the Big 12. "Baylor has a nice one," Cris Perkins said. "Alabama
has a nice one.
"Hate to say it, but Georgia has a real nice one," he said of Sharon's
previous employer, where she was an assistant coach before coming to
Tech. "But I don't think anyone has it all, like this: The stadium,
the indoor [batting cage and pitching} facility [just down the left
field line]. And the skyline view. I always thought the prettiest one
was Auburn. This is kinda the same. Except at Auburn, you don't have the skyline view. Here..." He paused. He smiled. He waved his hand across
the skyline, from Midtown to downtown.
"I think this day is as big as the day Sharon was hired," Cris Perkins
said. "That day, she was over the moon. This day..." And he smiled
again.
On Saturday, March 28, Florida State comes to town for a doubleheader
and that's when Tech will have a truly grand opening celebration. The
lights will go on for the first time on Friday, April 10, when N.C.
State visits for a twi-night double-header. Until then, the most
pressing matter will be this: With Shirley Clements Mewborn Field such
a long name and mouthful of a handle, what about a nickname?
Like the Ted, as Turner Field was quickly christened after opening in
1997. Or the Jake, for Cleveland's Jacobs Field. So...the Shirl? Not
exactly. The Mew, as Mike Huff, the Tech graduate assistant, called it on the air for ramblinwreck.com listeners during Tuesday's
twinbill? Not bad. Not bad at all.
Whitney Haller has another idea. "I'm so glad my senior year will be
here," she said. "I would've been so upset if I hadn't gotten to play
on this field."
Which field? "We'll probably just call it the Shirley," Haller said.
Yes. "The Shirley."
Somewhere, Shirley Clements Mewborn is smiling. Joni Mitchell, too.
Paradise, found anew. Fast Facts About Shirley Clements Mewborn Field |
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