When Ron West thinks about the Boston Red Sox's recent World Series success, he said it's not only in tribute to the players of yesteryear, like Carl Yastrzemski, but for the longtime fans who never lived to see it happen.
"It's for my grandmother, too," West said.
West and a slew of other die-hard Sox fans, young and old, gathered inside City Hall last night to get their pictures snapped with the team's World Series trophies from 2004 and 2007. The stop in Waltham was part of the 2008 World Championship Trophy Tour sponsored by the Massachusetts State Lottery.
West said as a kid he and his grandmother used to watch Sox games religiously. When the team finally won its first championship in 86 years in 2004, he said he visited his grandmother's gravesite to share the good news.
West said when he got married, he converted his wife to be a member of Red Sox Nation as well. He also brought his 9-year-old son Ben to see the trophies last night.
"I'm passing it onto the next generation," West said, wearing a Jonathan Papelbon shirt.
Sox fans who showed up to get their pictures taken between the two trophies were simply asked to follow one ground rule - not to touch the championship hardware.
"I wanted to touch it, I asked to touch it, but they wouldn't let you," Waltham resident and loyal Sox fan Jon Hayes said with a smile. Hayes was one of the first to get his picture snapped with the trophies.
After getting their pictures taken, most fans then stepped around to get a closer look at the trophies, investigating every inscription, every golden gleam.
Katie Gulloctti and her 11-year-old daughter Aislann, were also among the first in line to see the trophies as well. Gulloctti remembered the World Series victory in 2004 as an emotional day.
"I went to my first Red Sox game when I was 5, so I cried in 2004," she said.
Like many long-suffering fans, Gulloctti said she didn't think she would see the day when the team would win two championships in a four-year span.
"I was hoping to see one in my lifetime, are you kidding?" Gulloctti said. "With two, I can die a happy woman."
This is the second time the trophies have been displayed in Waltham this year. In April, the trophies were brought to The Chateau restaurant as part of the tour.
Richard Conn can be contacted at 781-398-8004 or rconn@cnc.com.
