Forty years ago today, Ferris Bueller, Cameron Frye and Sloane Peterson took their seats in left field at Wrigley Field while playing hooky from school for a day.
How do we know the scene from the Cubs game in the 1986 movie "Ferris Bueller's Day Off" occurred June 5, 1985? Well, that riddle was solved by some fantastic detective work from Baseball Prospectus’ Larry Granillo in 2011.
The highlight on the television — which principal Ed Rooney misses in the pizza place — features Cubs reliever Lee Smith pitching to Braves outfielder Claudell Washington. Ferris catches a foul ball off the bat of Washington, and Granillo's search of the game logs revealed Washington only hit one foul ball off Lee Smith, which occurred in the 11th inning of a game June 5, 1985.
In the four decades since, no one has pointed out which seats the daring trio actually sat in at the Friendly Confines. So, cllct went to Wrigley Field this week to get it done.
With the help of Cubs historian Ed Hartig, chief commercial officer Colin Faulkner and director of ticket services Brian Garza, cllct found Bueller's seats — or at least as close as anyone could get.
The scene with the actors in the stands was filmed at a different Cubs game, played in September 1985, and Hartig did the research to determine the seat location.
Hartig: Photo 1 shows them in a section directly in line with the old bullpen home plate, with no visible aisle in front of them, which would put them in the first section of boxes down the left-field line.
My guess is, there was no row 1 in that section due to the curvature of the wall.
Hartig: In photo 3, you see the top of a ramp two rows behind them and to their right as they face the field. No such ramp existed at the top of the first section of boxes at the time.
My speculation is they moved to section 104 — which would have the ramp, but, of course, would have had a visible aisle break in front of them. They would be on the end.
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Hartig concluded Ferris' foul-ball catch and Cameron saying “Swing Batter Batter Batter” were filmed in two different sections.
For the sake of argument, let’s say we care more about where Ferris caught the foul ball.
So, we met Garza and Faulkner at Wrigley Field to eyeball the view.
With new seats in place and fresh concrete compared to what existed in 1985, Garza looked at the video and still pictures and lined up the view down the third-base line to home plate, which remains unchanged.
Together with Hartig’s research, Garza came to the conclusion the most likely equivalent of the Ferris seat is section 3, row 13, seat 15, with Cameron in Seat 16 and Sloane in Seat 14.
Ironically, the Bueller seat is in the same section as the most infamous seat in the ballpark: Steve Bartman's seat from Game 6 of the 2004 NLCS debacle, located in section 3, row 12, seat 1.
So, as of today, there’s a new premium seat in left field that might cost a few extra bucks.
Cubs fans and Wrigleygoers, have at it.
And if you want something more, I’m honoring the 40th anniversary of the scene by putting my Ferris vest — which has been photo-matched to the Wrigley scenes among others — up for auction.
Darren Rovell is the founder of cllct and one of the country's leading reporters on the collectibles market. He previously worked for ESPN, CNBC and The Action Network.