Roger Maris Museum - Fargo North Dakota

We just hung around Grand Marais yesterday walking around downtown and enjoying the waterfront. The weather was weird; one minute it was 64 and comfortable and 15 minutes later it was 82. The a couple hours later it was 65 for awhile and 15 minutes later it was 82 again then for the rest of the day. We thought we would blog on our recent stop near Fargo North Dakota and the Roger Maris Museum.


Roger Maris was born Roger Eugene Maras (later changed to Maris) in Hibbing Minnesota but the family moved shortly thereafter and he spent his formative years in Fargo. Although Roger is best known for the "61" homer season in 1961 he was also a Gold Glove winner with an arm that maybe was even better than Roberto Clemente. He was a two-time League MVP, 7-time All Star and on 3 World Series winners (Yankees, Cardinals)


After he retired friends asked him about a museum. Roger agreed to it only if people of all means could see the museum, thus it is free and in the West Acres Mall in Fargo since 1984.


The museum consists of glass display cases along an aisle of the mall. There is an alcove off of the aisle that has stadium seats and a great movie on the life of Roger Maris. What he went through during his 61 homer year with the press lying about his relationship with Mickey Mantle, they were actually good friends, and some Yankee fans not wanting him to break Babe Ruth's record.


We then went to the display cases. Here is his plaque at Yankees Stadium when they retired his number 9.

Here is his Kansas City Athletics uniform

Roger played for the A's after one year with the Cleveland Indians before he was traded to the Yankees. He and his family like the Kansas City area so much that the family still lived there even when Roger played for the Yankees and later the Cardinals. After we left we realized we should have taken a picture of his Cardinals uniform for Jim of Tumbleweed.


Here is a replica of his Yankees locker

Showing some of his many awards

A good saying for life in general although this deals with home runs

How he is not in the Hall of Fame is amazing and a travesty because he did what he did with what are generally acknowledged as "dead" baseballs and no juice (performance enhancers).


It was good to walk around a mall and the West Acres Mall is a pretty good one. It is estimated that 7 million people visit the mall each year.


Photos of the museum have been uploaded to Flickr.com in the Fargo set.


Till next time,


Bob and Jo