Houston Astrodome Set to Open April 9

Feb. 6, 1965 - The Houston Astros will not get to see much of their new home after the three-day opening exhibition series and a league game with the Philadelphia Phillies on the fourth day. 

The Astros officially open the domed and air-conditioned stadium on April 9 with the start of a five-game weekend exhibition series. They play the New York Yankees on April 9, 10, and 11 and the Baltimore Orioles April 10 and 11, in a night-and-day schedule.

Houston will face Philadelphia in a league game on April 12 and then go on the road until April 23. 

The Astros play 19 of their first 29 games on the road and will visit each National League city three times during the season.

The National League pennant-race forecasters can have a field day studying the 1965 schedule — published today — for the last couple of weeks of the season.

In 1964, St. Louis, Cincinnati, and Philadelphia went into the last week of the season with a chance for the pennant.

If that should happen again, the schedule-makers would appear to have smiled on the Phils, who blew what looked like a certain pennant last season.

In the last two weeks of the forthcoming season, the Phils will have six games each against Chicago and New York, neither of which is expected to figure very high in the race.

St. Louis, Cincinnati, and Milwaukee will play most of the last two weeks on the road, with San Francisco and Los Angeles providing a big share of the opposition. 

In related news, Philadelphia’s proposed all-purpose sports stadium should be ready for the 1967 baseball season, Charles Day, City Commissioner of Public Property, said today. He said the stadium in South Philadelphia should be completed by Jan. 30, 1967.

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