Home Run That Changed Baseball
Hot Springs, Arkansas
On St. Patrick's Day 1918, Babe Ruth was pitching in a Spring Training game in Hot Springs. The team needed someone to bat, and Babe -- who wasn't considered a hitter -- promptly belted a pitch over the fence, out of the ballpark, across the street, over a wall, and into farthest pond of the neighboring Hot Springs Alligator Farm. It changed Babe's career, and baseball in general, since no one had ever imagined that a ball could be hit that far.
Exactly how far was unknown until 2011, when modern technology concluded that the ball traveled 573 feet on the fly (It helped that the alligator pond had remained unchanged through all those years). The spot formerly occupied by home plate was marked on the parking lot where the ballpark used to stand, a historical marker was erected across the street outside the alligator farm wall, and there's a sign inside the gator farm where the ball landed.