Eric Bunnell's People: 'Glad' tidings for the Graney Gang

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There may not be any joy wherever it was that mighty Casey struck out, but there’s jubilation in Jumboville.

Because Jack “Glad” Graney has hit a homer to Cooperstown.

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The St. Thomas native has been named the recipient of the National Baseball Hall of Fame’s 2022 Ford C. Frick Award for baseball broadcasting. After a 14-year career in the outfield for the then-Cleveland Indians, Glad in 1932 was the sport’s first player to head up to the broadcast booth, where he was the voice of the team for nearly 30 years. He died in 1978.

The award is a dream come true for Graney’s family and for members of the former Graney Gang of local baseball fans and historians who said recognition of Glad’s contribution to the game was long overdue.

“This is what we’ve all worked for, for so many years,” granddaughter Perry Mudd Smith emailed supporters this week with the news.

“I still can’t believe it,” she also shared.

“After so many years, Jack’s memory and career are still being honoured.”

In a game where stats are almost as important as the play itself, Glad was a player of many firsts.

Steve Peters, a member of the Graney Gang, enumerates in a post with five exclamation points.

“St. Thomas Proud!!!!!

“First player to wear a number on a uniform. First player to face Babe Ruth as a pitcher (Graney went 2 for 4.) First player to make the transition from the field to the broadcast booth.”

Quoth Hall of Fame president Josh Rawitch, “Jack Graney was a pioneer in the broadcast industry, not only establishing a model for game descriptions in the earliest days of radio but also for blazing a trail for former players.”

Glad – a member of the Canadian Baseball Hall of Fame, where a broadcast award bears his name, as well as a member of the St. Thomas Wall of Fame – topped the list of eight nominees for the 2022 Frick.

Perry says she and husband Ernie already have rented a place to attend the award presentation next summer in Cooperstown during the Hall of Fame’s annual player induction weekend. And the Gang is invited to party with the Smiths.

(Writes Steve, “I know where we are going in July.”)

And, maybe, Perry and Ernie will combine the trip with a motor they planned for this summer to St. Thomas from their home in the States to see the new Graney sculpture installed this year on that Fairview Avenue roundabout.

“When we do, we’ll look forward to seeing you all and giving you a big hug – HE MADE IT!”

Sad footnote

Of course, there is a sad footnote. Glad’s daughter, Margot Graney Mudd, who joined Perry for Glad’s unveiling on the Wall of Fame seven years ago at the former Timken Community Centre, but who also saw her dad passed by twice for the Frick honour, died in 2020 at age 98.

Emails Perry, “I just wish mom had been able to see this day.”

Magical displays

“It’s Elsa!” the little boy shouted as he recognized the Disney character.

He and family were on a daylight stroll Sunday through the St. Thomas Optimist Club’s reverse Christmas parade last weekend at Pinafore Park when they encountered Romantic Studio’s display, A Magical Frozen Christmas. Elsa and her castle were named the parade’s best theme entry. (Arthur Voaden secondary school’s giant Polar Express locomotive and train car was named the parade’s best overall entry.)

The family wasn’t alone at the park. Even in daytime, when the nighttime parade’s lights were turned off and the inflatables – like Romantic Studio’s Olaf – were mere deflated suggestions of their selves, the parade attracted spectators in cars and on foot.

Organizers are smiling that “well over 4,000 vehicles” drove through Pinafore during the parade’s official evening hours, even through a downpour Sunday night.

There wasn’t an immediate count of how much food spectators brought for Christmas Care, nor how much money, but organizers said there was lots of each.

“Thousands of dollars for the local food bank was raised and truckloads of food was received for Christmas Care.”

There were no reports of the massive traffic jams that the 2020 reverse parade caused in its first year, set up at the park after the Optimists cancelled their traditional procession downtown out of pandemic precaution.

And while some have missed the Talbot Street parade, Rebecca Horne posted on the parade’s Facebook page, “I actually kinda prefer this method of a parade.

“Keeping warm in your car, hot cocoa, no need for 17 layers, and you can dawdle a little bit at floats that are interesting!”

Indeed, social media is full of smiles like hers.

And there you have it.

Light the Night

While the reverse parade now has unplugged, lights strung through the park by service clubs to continue Sara Teare’s Light the Night project, remain on through the end of the year.

Still Standing

A save-the-date for 2022, already!

CBC is to air Still Standing’s visit this summer to Port Stanley on Jan. 12.

In the show, entering its seventh season, host comedian Jonny Harris — familiar as Const. Crabtree on Murdoch Mysteries — drops by communities across small-town Canada to celebrate their character.

“I’d love to come back,” the Newfoundland native told Port’s North Shore Beacon in a recent interview following his first visit to the village.

“Yeah, it wasn’t just me, there were a lot of the crew who were keen to get back to Port Stanley. … It’s a little bit like Newfoundland and a bit like Jamaica, and that’s a good combination. That’s what gave us screech.”

Sharing the prize

At $100,000, the Siminovitch Prize is Canada’s richest award for theatre, given annually to theatre makers to share with protégés.

This year’s recipient is Gillian Gallow, whose work Grand Theatre audiences saw most recently in London, Ont., in a visiting production of The Runner, the story of an Israeli search-and-rescue volunteer whose gruesome job is to collect all the bits of disaster victims for burial, as mandated by Jewish law. The one-man show was set on a 24-foot treadmill.

Gallow has named two protégés to share her good fortune, and one is Joshua Quinlan, an emerging artist whose set designs are seen each summer at Port Stanley Festival Theatre (most recently, Giving up the Ghost). Indeed, his first professional design was at Port.

For a number of years, Josh has been an assistant set and costume designer at the Stratford Festival. Gillian says of his talent, “His set work is really exciting to me. He seems to have a bold perspective on design.”

She says she hopes her selection of protégés will help propel their careers from assistantships into lead designers for Canadian stages.

Simon Joynes, Port Stanley artistic director, says the local theatre is “absolutely thrilled that Josh, a longtime member of the (theatre’s) family, has been recognized in this way.”

The local advantage

Sign out front says Briwood Farm Market is marking 30 years in business.

And Nancy Mayberry shares a lovely reason for the success of the small, indie grocery store owned by Brian Giles and Sherwood Lefler.

She posts to St. Thomas Happenings on Facebook:

“I want to give a shout out to the two men who helped me buy a Christmas tree this morning. This was at Briwood, where the manager and a young man spend a good half hour in 2 degrees temperature, holding up trees for me to examine until we discovered every one was too tall for a room with 10-foot ceilings.

“They obliged me by cutting 6 inches off the bottom, then removing the lower branches, then cutting another 6 inches off the top. After that, they carried it to my car, got it inside and added the branches for my later use.

“When I tried to tip the young man who did all the sawing, he refused and said he was well paid and was glad to help.”

Nancy concludes, “I am very grateful. Being an old lady sometimes has its advantages!”

And, just maybe, shopping local does, too!

Stay well.

ericbunnellspeople@gmail.com