Meet the Ricketts: Ties to the team

October 30, 2009 (CHICAGO) (WLS) -- The family that now owns the Cubs is successful in business, diverse in political views and committed to the common goal of winning a World Series with the team they've loved for a long time.

Pete, the oldest brother in the Ricketts family, lives in Omaha, Nebraska, where he helped grow the family business, T.D. Ameritrade, in to a multi-billion dollar public company. He's a conservative Republican who ran unsuccessfully for the U.S. Senate seat in Nebraska.

Tom will serve as the chairman of the board for the Cubs. The North Shore resident is a successful investment banker- and the only one of his siblings not to work for his father's company.

Laura, who lives in Chicago, is a liberal Democrat with a Michigan law degree. She serves on the board of Lambda Legal, an organization fighting for gay rights.

Todd, the youngest, attended Loyola and is a North Shore resident.

They may have their differences, but the brothers and sister are united by ballpark memories. Pete and Tom lived together in Wrigleyville when they were younger.

"That's right. We lived right on the corner of Addison and Sheffield," said Pete.

"Right across the street above the corner Sports Bar," said Tom.

"It was a fun neighborhood," said Pete.

"It's part of the bar now, that apartment," Tom said, laughing. "Now it's literally and officially part of the bar."

"Well we used to get tickets to all the weekend home games and sat in the bleachers and that was one of my favorite things to do is grab the Sunday paper, get out there early, read the paper, meet the people as they fill in around you. Watch a little batting practice and at 12 o'clock beer sales started and go grab a hamburger," said Pete.

"Yeah, it was a great year. You'd be sitting in your apartment every night or every game the buzzer would ring and it would be like, 'Hey, Dude, I've got some tickets. C'mon let's go.' And I'm like, 'All right. I was trying to do some work but all right, let's just do it.'"

"I don't know if you were out of the country for a bit or what have you but I stayed in one of the rooms in their apartment for the summer and just the sounds of game day, the smells, the crowds, the excitement. I don't know how you couldn't sort of catch that fever being in this environment," said Laura.

"When I was younger I used to sit right out here in the front row center field and I would always come out about 11 o'clock, or right when the gates opened and read the newspapers and watch batting practice and I think that to me it was just like a picnic with 40,000 of your best friends and that's what's so great about the bleachers and it still is," said Todd.

But the really big Wrigley Field memory belongs to Tom.

"I did meet my wife right here in center field. There was a bunch of us, and a bunch of her friends and we just started talking, and it's a true story, and we've been married for fifteen years," said Tom.

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local, ron magers

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