WRIGLEYVILLE — Scalpers didn't have online forums to peddle World Series tickets in 1945, but they were out in force then, too, when the Cubs were last in baseball's championship.
So active were scalpers in 1945 that the owner of the Cubs sent a letter to Chicago's newspapers apologizing to fans.
Headlined, "We're Burned Up, Too," Philip K. Wrigley wrote of how the team had worked hard to distribute the tickets fairly.
"However, once the tickets are in the hands of the public, there is nothing to prevent individuals from selling their seats at a neat profit through scalpers," he said. "Unfortunately, there are always a few people who prefer a quick profit to anything else."
He added, "We all know this to be true, but as we said to start with — we still do not like it."
Stuart Shea, in his book "Wrigley Field: The Long Life and Contentious Times of the Friendly Confines," said that 25 city detectives and 25 Revenue Department agents were sent out to stop scalpers for the series against the Detroit Tigers.
Some reports at the time said scalpers were getting as much as $200 for $7.20 box seats and $6 grandstand tickets were fetching $75. Bleacher seats, with a face value of $1.20, were scalped for $10.
This weekend, ticket prices for World Series games at Wrigley are through the roof. According to Forbes, the average price for a ticket to Saturday’s game is $7,161. The lowest prices are about $2,500 — but that's for standing room only.
The Tribune sports section reflects the popularity of tickets during the 1945 World Series.
In 1945, thousands lined up outside Wrigley's box office hours before it opened to legally buy tickets. But even there, opportunists sought to make a quick buck: Some sold their spots in line for $15. Shea writes that one guard was offered a fresh-caught, 6-pound fish for a spot in the queue.
Several scalpers were busted in Loop hotel lobbies. The judge ordered the tickets sold to local residents, and the scalpers were forced to give money to the Red Cross.
Also in court was the owner of a gas station across the street from Wrigley, at 3553 N. Clark St. His crime: charging a scalper $25 to use the station to sell tickets.
Fan gouging wasn't limited to tickets. They paid a premium for parking, too, says Sam Pathy in his book "Wrigley Field Year By Year."
Parking lots near Wrigley were charging a then-outrageous $2. The Office of Price Administration forced them to drop the price to $1.
"But fans claimed that the only thing that dropped were the signs that said $2," writes Pathy. "The lots continued to charge the higher amount when they could."
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