The mounted policeman who gave Yankee third baseman Wade Boggs a famous ride around the Stadium when the Bombers won the 1996 World Series has traded in his mountie blues for nurse whites.
Lt. James Higgins – whose moment of baseball glory was splashed across newspapers and rerun endlessly on the nightly news – retired this month after 29 years as a city cop.
But the 49-year-old Bronx native didn’t just ride off into the sunset. The end of one career gave him the chance to pursue another lifelong dream – he’s an emergency-room nurse at Franklin Hospital in Valley Stream, L.I.
“It’s just a continuation of being a policeman,” Higgins said. “It’s an even better job, if possible. You have a sense that you can make a difference.”
And it turns out nurses he works with have something else in common with cops.
“All the nurses here are diehard Yankees fans,” Higgins said.
“That’s all they talk about. They’re upset that it’s not a subway series.”
But even though they’re big fans, they don’t realize they have a piece of Yankees history in their midst. Higgins said his co-workers know he used to be a cop – they just don’t know he’s that cop.
Higgins – a mounted cop for 15 years – and his trusty steed, Beau, were detailed to Yankee Stadium in October 1996, the last time the Bombers played the Braves in the Series.
After the Yankees won it all in Game 6, Higgins rode out onto the field – and the ecstatic Boggs jumped on Beau’s, back behind the cop.
They then took a victory lap, with Boggs waving to the fans.
It was a special night for Higgins – but even then, he had nursing on his mind. He was already taking classes at Molloy College on Long Island.
“If you look closely at the pictures that night, you’ll see there’s something inside my shirt. It was my notes,” Higgins said.
“I was studying for an exam the next day.”
Higgins was with his twin 11-year-old daughters, Gina and Brittany Ann, at their soccer practice last night – so he couldn’t make it to the Yankees game.
But Beau was there, doing his job with a new partner in the saddle. Higgins said the Boggs ride was fun – but it didn’t change his life.
“My wife wasn’t too impressed with it,” he said. “She made me go out and mow the lawn the next day and throw out the garbage.”