OCT. 28, 1961
Construction begins on Municipal Stadium at Flushing Meadow Park, Queens; the ballpark will soon be renamed Shea Stadium in honor of William Shea, the influential lawyer who strong-armed Major League Baseball into establishing a new team in New York. Unable to persuade any National League teams to relocate here, Shea dreamed up the Continental League, an organization to compete with the majors. But baseball officials buckled, New York was awarded an expansion National League franchise, and the Continental League never saw its first bunt.
LATE 1962
The new stadium is nearly complete, but it is discovered that the structure is sinking into the swamp upon which it is built. In 1963, the Mets play their second season at the Polo Grounds in Harlem until the problem is corrected.
APRIL 17, 1964
An enthusiastic crowd of 50,312 settles into a sea of orange and blue seats — orange for the New York Giants, blue for the Brooklyn Dodgers — and watches the Mets lose, 4-3, to the Pittsburgh Pirates in Shea's inaugural game. Shea himself christens the ballpark with two bottles of water: one from the Harlem River near the Polo Grounds, former home of the Giants, and the other from the Gowanus Canal in Brooklyn, the closest waterway anyone could find to the Dodgers' Ebbets Field.
AUG. 15, 1965
The Beatles play to 55,000 fans at Shea, inventing the stadium rock concert and cementing the band's reputation. The screams of concertgoers, who pay as much as $5.75 for seats, are deafening: "As for what they sang or how they sounded, your guess is as good as mine," wrote Sandi Polacco, a fan who was there, on the Lively Set, a music Web site. For the record, the program included "Dizzy Miss Lizzy" and "Can't Buy Me Love."
JUNE 27, 1967
The makers of "The Odd Couple," the movie comedy starring Walter Matthau and Jack Lemmon, film a scene at Shea in which a batter hits into a triple play. The Mets are facing the Pittsburgh Pirates that day, and their star outfielder, Roberto Clemente, is originally pegged for the role. Clemente declines the job and the $100 pay, not wanting to appear weak at the plate. Pirates second baseman Bill Mazeroski takes the offer instead, nailing the hit in two takes and achieving film immortality with Felix and Oscar.
OCT. 16, 1969
In the sixth inning of Game 5 of the Mets' first World Series, a pitch by Dave McNally of the Orioles zips by Mets left fielder Cleon Jones and into the dugout. Jones complains that the ball hit him in the foot, but the umpire disagrees. Mets manager Gil Hodges emerges from the dugout and produces the ball, which features a smudge of black polish, presumably from Jones's shoe. Jones is awarded first base and the team goes on to win the game, 5-3, clinching the championship and earning the title "Miracle Mets."
JUNE 10, 1975
Playing in Shea for the second straight season as their stadium is renovated, the Yankees present a 21-gun salute in honor of Army Day. The cannons are filled with blanks, but the blast is such that part of the outfield wall is toppled, and another section is set on fire, and some windows are broken. The stadium fills with smoke and the game, against the California Angels, is delayed.
OCT. 25, 1986
During Game 6 of the Mets-Red Sox World Series, a soap opera actor named Michael Sergio parachutes onto the field, trailing a "Go Mets" banner. He and Ron Darling, the Mets pitcher, slap hands cheerfully before Sergio is escorted from the field and to jail. It soon emerges that Sergio was trying to win an "outrageous acts" radio contest on WXRK-FM, then the home station of Howard Stern. He loses. In the same game a weak grounder from the Mets' Mookie Wilson crawls through the legs of Red Sox first baseman Bill Buckner and into right field. Boston fans know the rest.
MAY 3, 1998
One or more people break into a storage room at Shea and abscond with uniforms, balls, bats and a unicycle belonging to Mr. Met, the eternally optimistic team mascot. "The people knew they were taking from Mr. Met," Derek Dye, then in his inaugural year as the mascot, bitterly tells The Village Voice. Strangely, the iconic, baseball-shaped head of Mr. Met is not taken or even defaced, leaving open the question of whether the thieves might have been Mets supporters. "Maybe there was a little teeny bit of respect," Dye says.
OCT. 26, 2000
The Mets reach the World Series for the first time in 14 years, but on this day their bid for a championship ends in Game 5 to the Yankees. It is the first Subway Series since the Yankees beat the Dodgers in 1956.