Commentary: Baseball stars set aside careers for military
By Spc. Rachael Tolliver
October 2, 2003
FORT DRUM, N.Y. (Army News Service, Oct. 2, 2003) -- My husband and I recently marked seven years of wedded bliss. As a type of celebration, the love of my life decided we should go somewhere for the weekend. His choice? Cooperstown, N.Y. ... be still my heart.
When we arrived in Cooperstown, I was surprised to see it did not resemble my preconceived notion of a factory metropolis encroaching on the hallowed ground of baseball fans. And I was relieved to find it had more to offer than that for which it has become so famous.
It was quaint -- located on the tip of Lake Otsego, and surrounded on both sides by tall hills. Cooperstown is a well-preserved small town, with small-town charm, settled by William Cooper.
While William Cooper did not mean much to me, his son's name certainly did. James Fenimore Cooper, author of "Last of the Mohicans," "The Pioneers," and "The Deer Slayer," was born in Cooperstown. Many of James Fenimore Cooper's stories were set in and around the Cooperstown area.
This quaint village also plays host to the Farmers' Museum, the Cooperstown Brewing Company, the Fenimore House Museum and several other wonderful attractions. One of those attractions is, of course, the National Baseball Hall of Fame, for which the town is most famous.
Admission to the Hall of Fame, as well as the Farmers' Museum, is free for military personnel. There are several different displays to visit, but the one we spent the most time at was the wall of fame with all the plaques of the inductees. The reason? We did not just look up our favorite players from days gone by, we visited each plaque that was decorated with a military disk identifying branch of the military in which the player served.
I was familiar with Ted Williams' service in the Marines during World War II and the Korean War, and I knew Pee Wee Reese was in the Navy during World War II. But I did not realize that so many ball players served in the military from 1942 to the Korean War. In all, one Hall of Famer served in the Civil War, 25 members served in World War I, 35 members and more than 500 major league players served in World War II, and five Hall of Fame members served in the Korean War.
For example, Ernie Banks, Whitey Ford and Willie Mays were all in the Army during the Korean War. During World War II, Yogi Berra served in the Navy and was stationed on a rocket launcher off the coast of Normandy Beach just after D-Day, while Leon Day, who was drafted into the Army, participated in Normandy after landing on Utah Beach with an amphibian unit.
Hoyt Wilhelm, whose knuckleballer won 143 games including a record 124 out of the bullpen and who started for the Orioles in 1958 where he pitched a no-hitter against the Yankees, served in the Army and earned a Purple Heart during the Battle of the Bulge.
Bob Feller was the first major leaguer to volunteer for active duty, enlisting in the Navy just two days after the Japanese attack on Pearl Harbor. He served as an anti-aircraft gunner on the battleship Alabama with the Third Fleet, which fought in battles at Tarawa, Iwo Jima and the Marshall Islands. The Hall of Fame pitcher authored three no-hitters and a record-sharing 12 one-hitters, compiled 266 wins and struck out 2,581 batters in his 18-year career, despite missing four years of his prime because of World War II.
Warren Spahn was the winningest left-handed pitcher in history with 363 wins. He served three years as a combat engineer during World War II, saw action during the Battle of the Bulge, was wounded in the foot and survived the collapse of the Remagen Bridge in Germany.
Phil Rizzuto, and Stan Musial, to name a couple, were both in the Navy. Joe DiMaggio was in the Army Air Corps, as was Hank Greenberg and Enos Slaughter.
Jackie Robinson was in the Army and was stationed at Camp Breckenridge, Ky., which happens to be in my backyard. In fact, Robinson signed his historic contract with the Brooklyn Dodgers while at Camp Breckenridge!
Something else I did not know was that Happy Chandler, who I knew was a United States senator and a governor of Kentucky, was baseball's commissioner from 1945-1951. I found this out when I saw his Hall of Fame plaque with a military disk recognizing his World War II service in the Army.
America's favorite pastime was secured by those who served in our other, but least favorite pastime: war. When I look at all the men, Hall of Famers or not, who took time out from their ball careers to protect this country and our way of life, a service disk hardly seems like enough recognition.
(Editor's note: Spc. Rachael Tolliver is a journalist with the 10th Mountain Division.)
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