where i learned to play ball

Good Morning,

I may be going a little overboard with this baseball business but when you’ve got two full museums worth of material you gotta work it!

Just in case you snoozed through my last couple MMN posts (no worries baseball tends to have this affect on me too), I’ve been learning about women’s baseball and the Negro Baseball Leagues. Following one of these entries, I received this hot tip from a MMN insider

Amanda,

Good evening. I enjoyed your email. Did you know that Minster had a woman who played in this league from 1951 through 1955? Check her out. Her name is Katie Horstman. I just did a search and there's lots of information on her.

Love you,
Dad

So...

Katie Horstman, now 76 yrs. old grew up in Minster, the same small town in Northwest Ohio where my Grandparents came or age and raised their families. With five brothers, Katie learned to play ball tagging along and insisting they include her in their games. At age 15, a scout spotted her in a church-league softball game and helped her earn a tryout for the All American Girls Baseball League.

That's when she announced she would be taking her talents South of "the Bend" to the Fort Wayne!...

(i.e. she signed a contract for roughly $250 a month to play for the Fort Wayne Daisies)

Having the same Midwest potato salad family reunion experience, I’ve perhaps walked across some of the same fields perhaps even swung a bat in the same park that sprung this Fort Wayne Daisy of the AAGBL.

While the story of what these pioneering women experienced remains interesting, what is most interesting to me is what became of Katie after the league.

I imagined rebellion.

Did she skip town for the bright lights, anonymity, and casual wear of a big city? Did she fall into a depression, get drunk on love and booze and settle down with a nice farm boy? Did she run for mayor of Minster and throw cheese from the dairy float in the Oktoberfest parade? (the main event each year in the German Catholic village of Munster).

No, Katie became a nun.

who then became a physical education teacher and...

This is where her story at least in my life's narrative picked up again. As a talented young female athlete with bloodlines in Minster, peep the word that you've joined the middle school track team and you will hear...

"Have you heard of the Minster girls?"

No matter that your 400 time clocks in around average, your "finishing kick" is only the Charlie Brown moments in your head...(i.e. if you close your eyes it seeeems fast!)

a response of "No, I have not,"

leads to the recounting of the remarkable lore of--KATIE HORSTMAN!...

After saying goodbye to another winning team, The Franciscan Sisters of the Sacred Heart, Katie barnstormed the Midwest, teaching physical education and eventually returned home to Minster and brought life to the girls' sports programs.

To give you an idea of her success I've "coped" (i.e. copied) a bit of her induction into the Ohio Women's Hall of Fame (2002)

By 1980, she focused on track and cross country. For the next five years, Coach Horstman's Minster girls team never lost a track meet. After being Runner-Up State Champions in 1975, the inaugural year of girls track and field, Coach Horstman's Minster girl's team won five consecutive state championships.

Given I have no real physical limitations to my imagination, I like to imagine Coach Horstman and I are kin. Had I arrived all spindly legged on her team quickly she would recognize an uncanny talent. "Our differences..." she would note "are our strengths." We are different. Katie could see I shouldn't throw heavy objects. I, with patience, could be taught the technique to harness my "ups" (high jumping) into a torpedo of bendy efficiency. Oh the records we would set...the heights we would reach!

Katie went from milking cows to shagging flies for the Daisies to...

medaling in the Olympics (2 gold 2 bronze) with her slow-pitch softball team in the Senior Olympic Games. Currently, she lives in the LA area. In addition to performing baseball education clinics her most recent efforts include doing work to establish a Palm Springs Elderhostel (another term I have only heard in Minster. It means Senior Citizens getting in a car and traveling some place for educational enrichment).

To me the greatest gift of Katie Horstman's legend is the jog she will always give to my favorite memory.

I was 10 years old playing backyard baseball with the boys. A stiff wind from the outfield blowing in a steady smell of country air (cow poop). With the bravado only mustered by a young girl wearing a plastic Cincinnati Reds helmet, I stopped my grandma on her trek out to the garden (she kept it next to the bullpen). I asked, "Grandma can you hit?"

My grandma in buckle-strap sandals grabbed a bat and cracked a jaw dropping fly ball I only wish an AAGBL scout could've seen.

and another...and another!!!...

Perhaps Grandma was showing us what all good women have to share. No matter the circumstance there's always a place in life for a heart with endless determination and resilience. Get on out there and Play ball! : )

Alright, that's what I have for today.

Wishing you an even happier Tuesday,

Amanda