Catherine Price, 83, of Vicksburg, holds two unused 1956 World Series tickets to the game in which Don Larsen pitched the only perfect game in World Series history. She and her husband used two box seat tickets to attend the game, saving the unused pair.

VICKSBURG — Truth be known, Catherine Price never was much of a baseball fan, not even 50 years ago when on Oct. 8, 1956, she witnessed one of the most famous games in the sport's history.

Don Larsen?

"I didn't know who he was," she says, laughing.

A perfect game?

"I didn't know what that was, either," she says, and she pauses, effectively, before adding, "but I sure learned that day."

On Oct. 8, 1956, New York Yankee Don Larsen pitched the only perfect game in World Series history, beating the Brooklyn Dodgers 2-0.

A half century later, Price not only still has the ticket stubs she and her late husband used that day to enter Yankee Stadium, she has two tickets, in mint condition, they didn't use.

Her husband, Powell Price Jr. - better known as Polly - loved to show those tickets and tell the story of how they came into his possession.

"And, boy, could he tell a story," Catherine Price says.

Since Polly Price died 14 years ago, we'll do the best we can to tell his story one more time.

Polly and Catherine Price worked at Rose Oil Co. in Vicksburg in 1956. Part of Polly's job was to sell tires, and he sold so many he won an award from U.S. Rubber Co.

First prize? A trip to New York to watch the World Series from box seats behind home plate.

Polly, a huge baseball fan and a Yankee fan at that, was thrilled. Catherine was more interested in seeing New York, staying at the Waldorf Astoria and seeing a couple of Broadway shows.

Game day came and the tickets were supposed to be delivered that morning to the Waldorf. Polly began to get antsy when by mid-morning the tickets had yet to arrive.

He went to check the front desk again. No luck. But darned if he was going to miss this World Series game, no matter what.

So he took matters into his own hands and pocketbook.

The game was a sell out, so he asked around in the lobby and was told where he might find a ticket scalper.

Cathy Box, the Prices' daughter who lives in Madison, says that what followed was her daddy's favorite part of the story.

"He took a cab down to the lower east side, where he was told to go," she says. "The address was a butcher shop where he was told to go to the alley out back."

There, he found a man in a trench coat and a fedora - "with one eyebrow," Cathy Box says, laughing - who sold him the tickets.

Polly Price never told anyone, least of all his wife, how much he paid for those tickets.

Meanwhile, of course, the original tickets had arrived at the hotel.

So the couple quickly caught a cab to Yankee Stadium, where they arrived just in time to watch Mickey Mantle take batting practice.

"Polly had intended to sell the tickets, but he was in such a rush to see Mickey Mantle, he forgot," Catherine Price says.

Yes, and after a few innings, Catherine Price learned what a perfect game was. How could she not? Everyone was talking about it.

"Polly was just beside himself," she says. "He was so excited I knew it had to really be something special."

Mickey Mantle swatted a fourth inning home run for the only run Larsen would need. In the next day's Washington Post, Shirley Povich, the famed baseball writer, wrote, "The million-to-one shot came in. Hell froze over. A month of Sundays hit the calendar. Don Larsen today pitched a no-hit, no-run, no-man-reach-first game in a World Series."

Yes, and that night, the Prices celebrated with cocktails and dinner at The Stork Club. Before they would leave New York, they would see both Damn Yankees and South Pacific on Broadway.

"To tell you the truth, I remember more about the plays than I do about the games," Catherine Price says.

But she does remember her husband putting the tickets away carefully and saying that "someday, these are going to be collector's items."

That some day is now.

Tickets that cost $7.35 originally probably would bring nearly a thousand times that much on the sports memorabilia market.

Even the stubs might bring as much as $1,000.

Stephen Carlisle, consignment director of Heritage Sports Collectibles, says the unused tickets could bring "upward of $6,000 each."

Not that Catherine Price is in any hurry to sell.

Those tickets have quite a history. After all, they survived a house fire at Christmas in 1974.

"We lost so many photos and other keepsakes, mostly from smoke damage," Catherine Price said. "But those tickets were in a shoe box in an older cedar chest and they didn't have any damage at all."

Baseball's Hall of Fame at Cooperstown, N.Y., would love to have them, Catherine Price says, and she might eventually donate them there.

But for now, the tickets stay in a safety deposit box where they remain, looking as new as they did the day they finally arrived 50 years ago this month at the Waldorf Astoria.