List of Life Accomplishments For Lincolnwood Man is Amazing

Some people have simple life goals while others seek to accomplish as much as they can and experience as many different things as possible.

Common among them are traveling the world, serving your country overseas, bowling a perfect 300 game, becoming a coach at your alma mater, taking up new crafts such as law, banking and accounting and experiencing first hand a Chicago Cubs World Series game - or, more realistically, maybe just having Cubs or Bears season tickets for a few decades.

It turns out one Lincolnwood man has done that. Not just one of the goals listed above, all of them. Even the one where he saw the Cubs play in the World Series.

Charles Greenstein has accumulated quite the list of life accomplishments, starting with his first job: helping out with the grounds crew at Wrigley Field on a volunteer basis as an 11-year-old in 1938.

“They didn’t have child labor laws back then like they do now,” said Greenstein, who recalled this and all of his other stories vividly during a recent interview with Patch.

“We went to Le Moyne School, which was just about 2 blocks east of Wrigley, so a groundskeeper came in one day to see if any of us would be willing to come help,” recalls Greenstein, who jumped at the chance since he and his father had been attending games already, and volunteering would mean he would get a free pass to bleacher seats to all the big games.

The biggest of games that year were played in the World Series. Against the New York Yankees. When they had Joe DiMaggio and Lou Gehrig. Joltin’ Joe hit a two-run dinger in the ninth inning of Game 2 at Wrigley that year and the Yankees wound up sweeping the Cubs 4-0 with a pair of wins back in the Bronx.

Since then, Greenstein has been to thousands of Cubs games at the Friendly Confines, growing up blocks away at Cornelia and Halsted and having been a season ticket holder since 1966. But DiMaggio’s home run still stands as the last memory he has of seeing his boys in blue in the World Series.

After graduating from Lane Tech in 1944, Greenstein enlisted in the Navy in January 1945. After training, he was on the way to fight in World War II in the Philippines, but the war ended on the way. He still served over there for a year, thus missing the 1945 World Series - when the Cubs were defeated by the Detroit Tigers.

No big deal. The Cubs had been to the World Series five times during the 1930s and 1940s and Greenstein figured he’d just catch the next one.

More than 70 years later, he still holds that to be true.

During those seven decades, Greenstein has worn a lot of hats. From 1953-1963, he practiced law after earning his law degree from Loyola University. In 1963, he became a certified public accountant and served in that role for another decade, until 1973, when he became a banker. In 1977, he was hired at the First National Bank of Lincolnwood.

While getting a taste of three different career paths in as many decades, one constant remained. Greenstein was the head bowling coach at Loyola for 45 years, retiring in 1995 when the sport was eliminated by the school.

His retirement came nearly a half-century after the crowning achievement only the sport’s elite can come even close to reaching. On March 4, 1948 at a small, now demolished, bowling alley near Wrigley Field, Greenstein bowled a 300 game as a member of the Blatz Youngsters club. He wears a ring to this day marking the occasion.

Greenstein’s passion for bowling earned him a spot in the Loyola University Athletic Hall of Fame and a close tie to what remains as the state of Illinois’ crowning achievement in another sport: men’s basketball.

“I still have the video tape of when we won,” Greenstein said of the 1963 NCAA Men’s Basketball National Championship - when Loyola defeated two-time defending champion Cincinnati in one of the game’s biggest upsets of all-time.

Greenstein watched the game from Alumni Hall with members of the student body and faculty.

“It was pretty hectic,” said Greenstein. “We are still the answer to a trivia question, What is the only Illinois school to ever win the college title?, but fewer know we were also the only team that had a starting lineup of all African-Americans.”

But through all of his memories, his accomplishments and great moments, there’s something about the Cubs that clicks with Greenstein more than anything else.

He can recall vividly the days of Stan Hack, Gabby Hartnett and Phil Cavarretta from the 1930s teams that came oh so close to glory.

Other favorites through the years were Andy Pafko, Bill Nicholson, Milt Pappas, Ken Holtzman and, of course, Ron Santo, Ferguson Jenkins and Ernie Banks - who Greenstein met when Mr. Cub was a guest speaker at a Loyola induction ceremony.

Nowadays, some baseball fans plan vacations around baseball games in other cities with a goal of reaching all 30 ballparks in the game. But there’s only one baseball experience for Greenstein, a fan for more than three quarters of a century.

Actually, he has been to two home fields during that time.

“Someone took me to a (White) Sox game one time, but it was years ago,” Greenstein quipped, not recalling the year, just that it was at the old Comiskey Park.

His loyalty to the Cubs grew so much, that at a game in 1965 with his three children, he decided season tickets was the way to go.

The tickets only included weekend games (and then night games beginning in 1988), but since then, he has been found thousands of times in Section 215, Row 1.

“I’ve had the same spot for years and I like it,” he said. “Since I’m in the first row, I get to put my foot on the railing.”

Greenstein only makes it out to a few games a year now, but has not missed a season opener since the mid-1960s.

Through the years, he has been there for the famous “Ryne Sandberg game” against the Cardinals in 1984, Billy Williams Day, Greg Maddux day and the game in 1985 when a Pete Rose hit put him three away from breaking Ty Cobb’s all-time record.

In 2000, Greenstein was selected at random before a game to be a part of the “Hometown Team” and was invited to stand at second base alongside then-Cubs’ second baseman Eric Young, who signed a ball for him and posed for a photo on the field.

He was also there for 8/8/88, the first night game ever played at the historic ballpark.

That’s one of the many scorecards stored in Greenstein’s home. He has an organized collection of memories, and had it not been for his mother tossing out some of this Tops baseball cards from his childhood when he was in the service, his collection would date back even further.

“I would have been a rich man today,” he said recalling some of the stuff he had back then.

Most of Greenstein’s fondest sports memories involve the Cubs, but he has also been a season ticket holder for the Bears for just as long. He goes to opening day for them, too, but the passion is not at the level he has for his baseball team.

“I was very passionate about the Bears when they had Sid Luckman,” he said, sharing his wish that the current team drop quarterback Jay Cutler.

Greenstein’s notable moments as a Bears fan aren’t unworthy of a mention, though. He watched from the Upper Deck at Wrigley in 1963 when the team won the NFL Championship and later got George Halas’ autograph. On December 7, 1941, he remembers the game between the Bears and crosstown rival Chicago Cardinals being halted temporarily to announce that Pearl Harbor had been attacked. He remembers because he was there.

But while he questions the current direction of the Bears, the Cubs’ future is bright, Greenstein says.

“I think we could make the playoffs this year, but it may be too early to win,” he says, praising some of the young talent the club has acquired in recent years.

“It was a great move to keep (Kris) Bryant in the minors for 10 days so he won’t be able to become a free agent for another year. (Starlin) Castro is good but has lapses, he should be in right field more often. And (Anthony) Rizzo has really adjusted.”

The team will need to add another pitcher to make a run, however.

“(Kyle) Hendricks isn’t the answer,” according to Greenstein.

Going to Cubs games almost exclusively may have satisfied Greenstein’s love of baseball, but he still wound up traveling the nation anyway by visiting his three daughters, all of whom have earned degrees and held positions in a variety of regions throughout the United States.

Marla earned an undergraduate degree from Georgetown University in Washington, D.C. before enrolling in law school at Loyola and now lives in Alaska. Caryn attended college in Massachusetts, worked at Princeton University in New Jersey for a year, earned a Master’s at City University of New York and now resides in Wyoming. Vicki went to school at Colorado State University - Pueblo before returning to the Chicago-area.

But Greenstein and his wife, Lenore, took traveling even a step further. They have traveled nearly the entire world - everywhere except Israel and Africa.

Even after decades of compelling personal stories, At age 88, Greenstein is still at it. He has served as the treasurer for the village of Lincolnwood for the last 12 years.

It’s been a fun ride for Greenstein. But through all the great moments, there’s one experience that has yet to be fulfilled for the longtime Cubs fan.

As a native south sider who actually wouldn’t mind seeing it happen, I’ll do my part in not mentioning it.

Photos:

-Greenstein showing one of the many exhibits proving he is indeed a “Die-Hard Cub Fan.”

-Holding up a puzzle of a mural that is on display at two locations at Wrigley Field. Obviously depicting himself, the mural was created after Greenstein was photographed by a team photographer getting an outline for the mural that would eventually be placed in the concourse.

-Showing off the ring that represents the 300 game he bowled in 1948.

-Pointing to one of the many memorabilia items stored away.

-A list of just some of the items he has.

-The videotape from Loyola University’s 1963 men’s basketball championship victory.

-A photo of Greenstein when he was inducted into the Loyola University Athletic Hall of Fame.

-Cubs World Series tickets (Printed preemptively in 1998 and mailed to all season ticket holders, just in case.)

-A scorecard decorated with keepsakes.