FACTBOX: Key dates in the history of Yankee Stadium
(Reuters) -- Yankee Stadium, which will close after this season, hosted 37 World Series, with the Yanks winning 26. It also hosted prizefights and notable U.S. football games.
Following are important dates in the stadium's history:
April 18, 1923 -- Yankee Stadium opens. Babe Ruth hits the stadium's first home run.
October 1927 -- Ruth sets the then-record of 60 home runs and leads the famed "Murderers' Row" to a World Series victory.
1928 -- Notre Dame Coach Knute Rockne invokes the memory of school football hero George Gipp, telling his players during halftime to 'Win just one for the Gipper'. Notre Dame rallies to beat Army 12-6.
June 22, 1938 -- Joe Louis knocks out Max Schmeling in the first round in defense of his heavyweight boxing title. Schmeling, a German championed by Adolf Hitler's Nazi government, had earlier knocked out Louis in a non-title bout. Rocky Marciano, Floyd Patterson, Ingemar Johansson and Muhammad Ali all had at least one fight at the stadium.
July 4, 1939 -- The terminally ill Lou Gehrig gives a tearful farewell, saying he was "the luckiest man on the face of the earth", after playing a then-record 2,130 consecutive games for the Yankees.
October 8, 1956 -- Don Larsen pitches the only perfect game in World Series history, retiring every Brooklyn Dodgers batter in Game Five.
December 28, 1958 -- The New York Giants lose to the Baltimore Colts 23-17 in overtime in the National Football League championship, in what is often referred to as "the greatest game ever played".
October 1, 1961 -- Yankee Roger Maris hits his 61st home run, breaking Ruth's single-season record.
October 4, 1965 -- Pope Paul VI celebrates Mass before 80,000. On October 2, 1979, Pope John Paul II celebrates Mass.
April 15, 1976 -- After a two-year renovation, the stadium reopens. The Yanks make it to the World Series for the first time since 1964 but are swept by the Cincinnati Reds.
October 18, 1977 -- Reggie Jackson hits three home runs on three consecutive first pitches in Game Six against the Los Angeles Dodgers. The Yanks win the Series.
October 1998 -- Yanks win 114 regular season games and then sweep the San Diego Padres in the Series.
September 23, 2001 -- A memorial service is held for victims of the September 11 attacks.
April 20, 2008 - Pope Benedict celebrates Mass before 57,000.
September 21, 2008 - Scheduled final regular season game.
(Reporting by Philip Barbara, Editing by Clare Fallon)
