"And now ladies and gentlemen, how about a big hand for Charley Smith and all of those good people at Cushwa Brick for their special effort in making this day possible. Thank yew-w-w-w."
Once baseball season opens today, you won't find Charles Smith patrolling the outfield at Oriole Park.
But Mr. Smith, a foreman and bricklayer with Eldersburg-based Baltimore Masonry Inc., has already made one of the great catches at Baltimore's new ballpark. It came last summer out near the right field fence, where he noticed that his crew would need an odd-shaped brick to complete construction of the ballpark's exterior wall.
He caught the design flaw in time for the brick-maker, Cushwa Brick Inc. in Williamsport, to produce the needed building block in record time and to keep construction on schedule.
"We literally dropped everything to do it," recalls John A. Latimer III, president of the Washington County brick manufacturer. The company designed, produced and shipped the bricks in about 10 days -- a process that normally takes six to eight weeks.
"It takes time," Mr. Latimer says. "You have to make a mold, then the bricks, dry them, fire them, cool them and package them for shipping."
But this was for Oriole Park, and, as he says, "any time something for the stadium came up it got top priority."
The result: Baltimore Masonry completed its six-month contract on the final day, without holding up any other phase of construction.
Workers at Baltimore Masonry and Cushwa Brick are among the hundreds of unsung heroes who turned in all-star performances to complete Baltimore's $106.5 million showcase baseball stadium on time and on budget.
They battled unforeseen problems, design changes and the weather to complete their jobs. But they survived through hard work, long hours, innovation -- and some good luck.
If there was an Oriole Park construction Hall of Fame, Alan J. Petrasek would likely be another early inductee. Mr. Petrasek, stadium project manager for the George Hyman Construction Co., came up with a unique approach to building the step-like riser in the main level of the stadium. It saved between 2 1/2 and three months of construction time.
Instead of the traditional method of building frames and pouring concrete, Mr. Petrasek came up with the idea of using a concrete-extrusion machine, normally used to make the 3-foot-high median barriers along highways, to produce the risers.
"It was the first time it had ever been done," he says with a smile of satisfaction. The actual development of the extrusion machines, about the size of an automobile, was done by Greenwald Inc. of Odenton.
Melvin Pennell, an artist with Belsinger Sign Works Inc., wasn't lucky enough to invent a new machine to make his job easier. In a race against time, Mr. Belsinger was working every daylight hour hand-painting the Giant Food and Home Team Sports advertising billboards on the wall of the Orioles bullpen beyond the left field wall.
And he got a good soaking recently when members of the ground crew ran a test of the stadium sprinkler system.
That wasn't the only mishap. Design changes created havoc among some subcontractors.
Take Claire V. LaRocco, who heads the company responsible for the cabinets and the millwork trim in the mahogany-accented luxury sky boxes. Things were proceeding smoothly for her company, Schill/Greenbrier of Ronceverte, W.Va., until the phone rang one day last fall.
The call was from Robert C. Krueger, another executive with George Hyman Construction, and it was bad news. There had been a design change in a couple of the sky boxes, including team owner Eli S. Jacobs' sky box, to add spiral staircases to a labyrinth of meeting rooms below. The redesign called for new cabinets.
The call sent an alarm through the Schill/Greenbrier factory, where about 50 workers were involved in a number of other projects. The company viewed its stadium work as a "high-profile project" and the message to the factory, according to Ms. LaRocco, was: "This is for the stadium -- do whatever we have to do to get it done."
Production immediately shifted into a higher gear as cabinetmakers began working 10-hour days, reporting to work on Saturdays and some Sundays.
The new marble-top cabinets were in place early last week.
But Mr. Krueger was still hoping for the cooperation of Mother Nature to complete a final project in Mr. Jacobs' suite: gluing down the carpet in the outdoor portion of the sky box. "This may be our last shot at it," Mr. Krueger says into his walkie-talkie as he walks through the stadium, looking for details needing attention. "The forecast is for the temperature to reach 62 today, then cool off again," he adds, explaining that the glue won't set nTC at temperatures under 60 degrees.
One of the bigger projects still on Mr. Krueger's work list last Tuesday was filling in nail holes in the decorative crown molding outside the executive suites. "Millwork is hot," Mr. Petrasek says. "That's going to be our biggest push today. We're going for perfection at this stage of the game."
Long hours have been the norm since work on the stadium began, says Norman Pitsenbarger, senior project manager for DynaLectric Co., which handled much of the electrical work.
"I mean, like six days a week, 12 hours a day."
Mr. Pitsenbarger, his assistant Robert Read and other coordinators hustled to stay ahead of the company's electricians, who were installing wires and cables. They had to spot any potential problems and work out a solution in advance so that the equipment installation could move ahead on schedule.
While things generally went pretty smoothly, Richard Wagner and James Kee remember a few times when they had to "jump through hoops" to meet production schedules. Like the night a few weeks ago when the Orioles staff were ready to move into their executive offices in the renovated warehouse adjacent to the ballpark.
Mr. Wagner and Mr. Kee are executives of Omni Construction Inc., the company responsible for the warehouse renovation. While most of the city was sound asleep, they worked until 3 a.m., checking out the fire alarm system so the fire marshal could approve the project for the move the next day.
Omni was also responsible for construction of the nine-story scoreboard. When the scoreboard was redesigned last June it put the company in somewhat of a time pinch. Mr. Wagner, who took a week off during the Christmas holidays but has had only two days off since, remembers the hectic pace and extra effort of his people to complete the scoreboard on time.
The deadline was Feb. 2. "It was a Sunday and it was probably the coldest day of the year," Mr. Wagner says, recalling that he and Mr. Kee were on the job at 6 a.m. They were still there at 11 p.m. when the final weld was made and the inspector approved the project.
Contractors responsible for the electronic components of the scoreboard, including the giant video screen, were due to begin their part of the project nine hours later.
As with most major construction projects, there were penalties for not completing work on time and "they were stiff," Mr. Kee says.
"But the goal that drove everyone," he adds, "was to get everything done by Opening Day. There was a great sense of pride in working on such a visible project and meeting that goal was the driving force, not any worry about a penalty that was probably a couple thousand dollars a day."