“You’re killing me, Smalls!”
One of my all-time favorite baseball movies is “The Sandlot”.
The movie is set in California but I recently found out much of the movie was
filmed in the Salt Lake City, Utah area. So we were able to visit some of the
locations this past summer.
We started out on a very hot day just like some in the
movie.
Our first stop was the little league field at Rose Park. We first parked in the lot next to a baseball
field. The field looked fairly new, and turned out to be the wrong field but we
took some pictures and found 7 cents laying on the ground almost enough to buy
a 98 cent baseball. We noticed another
field in the distance and walked a ways and found the older field which was
next to the other parking lot.
We immediately knew it was the actual field we
were looking for. Rose park field
basically looked the same today except for the new advertising. This was where
they took on the little league team and “kicked the crap out of those guys.”
Our second stop was the Sandlot. Most of the movie was here including losing
the baseball signed by ”Some lady named Ruth. Baby Ruth.” and getting that ball
back, trash talking including “you play ball like a girl” and of course so much
baseball. Now days there’s not much to
see just a little open area between houses.
 |
Small's house |
 |
Benny's house |
Next was Small’s and Benny’s houses. We just drove by for a
couple pictures. Multiple scenes during the
movie were here. This was where early on when smalls just moved in and was
unpacking, where Smalls tried to learn to play catch with his step dad and
Benny inviting Small’s to the Sandlot.
After this we stopped at Liberty Park and had a nice walk
around. The park was where the Founder’s day celebration was held. This was briefly shown when they were being chased by the
dog after getting the Babe Ruth ball back. They then ran through the picnic and
flipped the cake. I’m not sure what part they ran through.
Our last stop in Salt Lake City was the Vincent Drugtore
which was where they bought the 98 cent baseballs. We drove by for a couple
pictures but the place looked like it was empty/closed and according to google
is permanently closed.
Our final stop was the next day at the pool in Ogden, UT. The pool was similar now days but they have
added a slide and the pool had a different name. This was the pool scene that everyone
remembers where “We got banned for the pool forever that day” I didn’t remember
until we rewatched the movie but while being chased by the dog they go through
the pool again with little kid saying big doggie! Then they crossed a bridge
and river just like we did.
This was a great adventure and maybe the best yet. I had so
much fun seeing all these places which brought back great memories of one of my
favorite movies.
