Linda Hebert Todd

She did what the hard-hitting Angels couldn’t do that night in June of 1941. June first, to be exact. She put the Angels in the “win” column, and sent her daddy to the showers when she arrived on Planet Earth and yelled Hello World. Here I am.

Here’s what happened:

6-1-41 Padres/Angels

Wally Hebert was on the mound with a six-run lead. Everything seemed to be going his way. He was in the zone, tossing strikes and forcing infield flies, and generally making life miserable for the hapless Angels.

Baseball season in 1941 was starting on its third month. I was a lonely five-year-old only child who amused herself with two imaginary playmates named Lavory and McGuvney. But not for long. I would soon have a baby sister or brother. My mother, whom everyone called Bobbie, had a little time left before the new baby was expected to arrive, but everything was ready.

Back to the ball park—Wrigley Field in Los Angeles. Wally Hebert was on the mound systematically sending the Angels’ batters back to the dugout in high dudgeon. Word came to the press box, and the Padre manager got the word that Hebert’s wife had given birth to their second child. The manager, Cedric Durst, knowing how laid back his usually reliable pitcher was, sent word to the press box to share the good news over the public address system and radio.

The newspapers had a field day the following day. The Los Angeles Times had this to say.

“We’ve seen ball games won and lost in a lot of different ways, but we were treated to a brand new one yesterday afternoon and early evening at Wrigley Field.”

Of all things it was the stork who gave the Angels victory in the second game of the twin bill. 

Here’s what happened. The Padres had already put the hurt on the Angels in the first game, 9-5. They were breezing along in the second game with a 6-0 lead when Los Angeles came to bat in the sixth inning.

So far Hebert had limited the home team to three skimpy singles. In fact, it looked like the game was probably over, and half of the 5,500 paying customers had gone home for supper. Then came the announcement. 

“Attention everyone. We have just received word that opposing pitcher Wally Hebert has become a father for the second time. His wife, Bobbie, gave birth in San Diego to a boy. Mother and baby are doing fine. Congratulations to Mr. and Mrs. Hebert.”

Applause broke out all over the stadium in spite of the home team’s woes at the hands of the enemy. His teammates were cheering and it took a while for everyone to settle down and get back to the game. However, the normally unflappable Cajun never did settle down. No more strikeouts. No more infield flies.

Hebert subsequently gifted the Angels with four runs on four hits and four walks. Angel bats came to life and the six-run lead faded away. Manager Durst had to take Hebert out. The Angels continued the pounding against the next two Padre pitchers and ended up with a 9-8 win in extra innings. 

The Times thought the whole thing rather strange because when his first baby (that would be me—Linda Fay) was born five seasons earlier, he went out and pitched a one-hit shutout.

Earl Keller, sportswriter for the San Diego Tribune, shined some light on the cause of the confusion over the gender of the newcomer. Writes Keller: “Just a line to tell you that Hebert’s baby turned out to be a girl–named Hillene–so now he has two daughters. Somebody took the message for the telegram over the phone wrong and the wire to Hebert read, ‘Earl has arrived.’ It should have read ‘Girl has arrived.'”

Someone somewhere along the line got their facts wrong that day. I became big sister to Mary Hillene that Sunday afternoon in San Diego.

*

Rest in  Peace, Baby Sister. We’re gonna miss you.

Mary Hillene Hebert Deaton. June 1, 1941-December 1, 2019

The preceding article appeared in Chapter 14 of From The Bayou To The Bayou: The Odyssey of Wally “Preacher” Hebert by yours truly, Linda Hebert Todd.

From The Bayou To The Big League: The Odyssey Of Wally “Preacher” Hebert is finally published. It’s live on Amazon for $19.95, and I will be selling them for $20.00. It’s the story of my father’s professional baseball career as well as memories of his early life and  later years. It’s been two years in the making, and I’m finally able to get back to the blog I’ve been neglecting. Here’s the back cover blurb from the book. If you enjoy baseball history you might be interested.

The young skier laughed as the spray from his water skis washed over the old man sitting in the bass boat. He signaled the driver to make another pass at the fisherman, who was wringing out his camo baseball cap before returning it to his head, now plastered with sodden salt-and-pepper strands of hair. The young man was having fun at the old guy’s expense. This would be his third pass at the geezer. The ski boat banked and made the turn, heading straight for the green metal fishing boat. Just as the skier turned for a third drenching the old man stood, his fishing rod gripped in both hands. The rod caught the skier squarely on the stomach, and he soared into the lake, losing both skis.

Neither the driver of the boat nor the skier saw the fisherman paddle toward shore. The young men would have been surprised had they known the old man’s history. Perhaps they wouldn’t have been so quick to take him on. He spent fourteen years—from 1930 until 1943—in professional baseball. He knew how to swing a bat. And he struck out Babe Ruth.

From the bayous of southwest Louisiana to the baseball cities of St. Louis, Hollywood, San Diego, and Pittsburgh, this is an account of the life of Wally “Preacher” Hebert, a curly-headed left-handed pitcher whose life stories prove that truth is usually stranger than fiction.

Update

Update on From the Bayou to the Big League:I have two more baseball years to finish—1939 and 1940. I’m halfway through with 1939. I hope to have the first draft finished by Christmas. Then the revision begins. Here’s an account of a game in the 1939 season.

Hebert Gives Padres Split

Veteran Southpaw Hurls Four-Hitter to Annex 3-0 Nightcap

Oakland was in San Diego for the start of a nine-game series against the Padres. They had made up their minds they could win at least six of those games. After the first game of Tuesday’s double bill they felt more confident than ever. At the end of a game lasting an interminable two hours and twenty-two minutes they had eked out a closely- fought 8-6 victory. Ten of those minutes were taken up by a sixth-inning brouhaha that finally ended with young Padre first-baseman George McDonald being asked none too politely to leave the field by umpire Wally Hood.

Oakland bats sent two San Diego pitchers to the showers. All of this was enough to get the home team’s collective back up, and egged on by the raucous cheering squad in the stands they vowed vengeance on the visitors later in the nightcap.

The Oaks swaggered into the dugout, ready to shellack the border city boys a second time. They watched the home team take the field and start tossing the ball around, yelling and slapping their gloves. Not demoralized at all, it would seem. Wally Hebert stepped on the mound and took his practice throws. The same Wally Hebert with eight notches on his victory belt. Hmm. Might not be so easy after all, the visitors thought. Turns out they had reason to worry.

Hebert was in complete control of Oakland at the plate. He scattered four hits among four innings, and the visitors were unable to capitalize on them—zeroes across the board in the run column.

While Hebert had silenced Oakland bats, San Diego’s came alive enough to give the Padres three runs on six hits to take the contest 3-0. Not only did he do his part on the mound, he was also involved in the two times the Padres put runs up. In the third inning catcher Bill Starr doubled and Hebert belted a single. A bad throw by Oakland’s center-fielder resulted in Starr crossing the plate. 1-0.

After an uneventful fourth inning the Padres struck again. Hebert drew a walk and became a base runner. George McDonald smashed a triple, scoring Hebert. Bunny Griffiths laid down a perfect bunt and McDonald scored for the second run. 3-0. One more inning to go in the short nightcap. The gentleman from the bayou applied the finishing touches and retired the side. Oakland defeat brought Hebert’s record to nine victories and two defeats with a percentage of .818. This put him in second place among Pacific Coast hurlers. He who laughs last laughs best.

A quick update on my dad’s book. I’m nearly finished with the baseball years, which is the biggest portion of the book. I just finished up with the 1937 season. (Yay.) I still have 1938, 1939, and 1940 to go. He was in baseball from 1930 through 1943. I’ve finished all the other years. I’m aiming for the end of November to finish the first draft. Then the revisions start. I’m sharing the write up for a game in September of 1937 just before the playoffs started. I hope to have the book out sometime in January.

Wally Hebert Shuts Out Seraphs, 5-0

The Angels had been in San Diego for a week and were ahead in the series three games to two. The Padres didn’t want the Angels to make it four games to two so they came to Lane Field ready to play ball on September 12.

They put Wally Hebert on the mound and he responded with a two-hit shutout, tying the series three games to three. Hebert’s teammates came through with five runs on eleven hits. A double-header was scheduled for the next day.

With both teams and Padre fans on edge for four innings of airtight baseball the home team finally got one on the board when McDonald got himself a double. Catcher Starr tagged a slow rolling single, allowing McDonald to move to third. A single by third baseman Holman sent McDonald home for the first score of the game.

The Padres got to Angel pitcher Prim in the seventh inning when they added three runs on five straight hits. This included a single by Hebert that resulted in a run batted in for the pitcher, helping his own cause. San Diego’s final tally came in the eighth inning—a kind of in your face, catch me if you can challenge to the hapless Angels.

Hebert had been humming along, putting batters down in short order. He held them to one hit—in the fourth—for the first eight innings, but loosened up somewhat and let them have one more in the ninth.

Everyone went home happy. The fans were enjoying a winning afternoon. The batters—except one—had all hit safely at least once. The pitcher added another notch on the victory column. Management was glad the team was still in the first division. The pennant was on the horizon.

I’m coming along on schedule with From the Bayou to the Big League, having finished up with the 1936 season. This offering is from that chapter. I’m about three articles into the 1937 season, which will be a long one since that’s the year the Padres won the pennant.

The Missing Angel

HEBERT’S HURLING TOO MUCH FOR LOS ANGELES

PADRES SMASH LOSING STREAK WITH 5-1 WIN

San Diego Triumphs Over Angels, 5 to 1, Behind Five Hit Hurling of Hebert

If the Los Angeles Angels had a guardian angel, he must have taken the day off on Wednesday, June 3, 1936. He was nowhere to be found at Lane Field in San Diego that day. Maybe he simply missed the train. Or perhaps he had another client who needed him more.

At any rate, he wasn’t around during his team’s hour of need when the San Diego Padres took his charges apart to the tune of 5-1. I guess he thought since they were enjoying a three-game winning streak and their opponents, the Padres, were slogging their way through four straight defeats, his darlings could do without his help for one day. Wrong thinking—especially since Wally Hebert was on the mound that day.

Hebert had his foes eating out of his hand throughout most of the afternoon. The Angels caught a break in the fifth inning—the only stanza where they put a lone run on the scoreboard and denied Hebert a shutout. The Angel catcher hit a long fly to left field, which dropped safely at the fielder’s feet due to a miscalculation of where the ball was headed. The batter made it to third base and came home when a teammate hit a grounder to first.

After that, it was smooth sailing for the Padre southpaw, silencing Angel bats the last three innings. He allowed a stingy five hits over nine innings and registered six strikeouts. The game was his second straight win over the Angels, whom he beat during the open week of season 1936.

On the offensive side Hebert’s teammates came through for him, but he also helped his own cause in the third inning with a double and a run-batted-in. His mates added two more in the fourth and sixth innings as they coasted to a 5-1 victory.

It would seem even if said guardian angel had made it to the game he would have had to work overtime to help his charges along to victory.

I’m a little over halfway through the first draft of my bio/memoir about my dad: From the Bayou to the Big League. I’m going year by year of the baseball years—1930 through 1943. I’m working on 1936 now, and the only ones I have left to finish are 1937 – 1940. Today I’m sharing a write-up about a game in 1936.

PADRES ROUT ACORNS, 16-0

Hebert Registers Eleventh Win of Season as Mates Ruin League Leaders

The headlines delivered the synopsis, but the clipping from the Los Angeles Times related the details. Oakland, sitting atop the standings, paid a visit to Lane Field on June 16 in San Diego, and looked nothing like the first-place team they bragged about being. The Oaks went through four pitchers trying to quiet Padre batters. The home team took advantage of seventeen hits served up by the unfortunate quartet, as well as four errors by the Oakland fielders.

Wally Hebert, on the other hand, was the lone hurler the Padres put on the mound. He pitched shutout ball for nine innings, scattering nine hits sparsely throughout, posting his eleventh victory of the 1936 season. Since he did so well on the mound, he can be forgiven for being the only Padre to post goose eggs at the plate. All eight remaining Padres posted at least one hit. Three batters—Myatt, Durst, and McDonald, hit safely three times, and another three—Holman, Desautels, and Wirthman—got two hits apiece.

Vince DiMaggio started the brou-ha-ha in the bottom of the second inning with a home run. San Diego hitters batted around, scoring five runs on the way. DiMaggio came to bat for the second time and was fanned to end the frame. The Oaks, I’m sure, were thankful for a chance to rest.

The Padres went on to score once in the third, and twice in the fourth. Another five run rout took place in the sixth and two more scored in the seventh. They couldn’t resist twisting the knife one more time and put another run in the “W” column in the eighth. 16-0. Oakland had one more chance to do something in the top of the ninth and managed to get two hits off the southpaw. The runners died on base and the game, mercifully for Oakland, was in the books.

Just returned from a productive five days in Nacogdoches, Texas, where I spent a week at a writer’s retreat sponsored by the Writer’s League of Texas. I was enrolled in the nonfiction class in hopes of getting feedback and advice on the book I’m writing about my father—From the Bayou to the Big League: The Odyssey of Wally “Preacher” Hebert.

I had five other classmates in the workshop along with instructor Rachel Starnes. The one thing they all agreed on was that I needed to rewrite the preface. I had started out with a mini-bio of Babe Ruth of about five paragraphs and didn’t get to anything about my father until the second page. They all thought it was going to be a book about Babe Ruth and were surprised when they got to the next page with a brief paragraph or two about Wally Hebert. I don’t want a reader to think that and put the book down before finding out who it’s really about.

I mean, what can I possibly say about Babe Ruth that hasn’t been said a million times already? This is my dad’s story and I want that made clear from the beginning. I’ve shared my rewrite below. The original preface appeared in the June 25th blog post of this year.

Preface

Yankee Stadium
May 1931
Yankees versus Browns

“You can put that slow curve right up your ass.”

The Sultan of Swat—aka Babe Ruth—had this piece of advice for the young, curly-headed rookie standing on the pitcher’s mound. Ruth handed this homily out as he trotted back to the dugout after being thrown out on first base in the second phase of a double play he had hit into.

Before that, the tall southpaw for the St. Louis Browns had taken the pitcher’s mound in relief. He was greeted by 40,000 screaming Yankee fans in the House That Ruth Built.  This was the dark-haired Cajun’s initiation into the major leagues. His first pitch in the big leagues resulted in a base hit that advanced two base runners. The next batter strolled to the plate and took his stance. Who stood some sixty feet away swinging his bat? The Bambino himself.

With the bases loaded the rookie was facing the most dangerous hitter in baseball. What a way to start a major league career. He tossed Ruth a curve and the Caliph of Clout hit into a double play, ending the inning and stranding two runners.

The Browns went on to win that game, and the young man from Louisiana beat the Yankees three more times that season. In one game he pitched an eight-inning shutout against the World Champion Athletics. In another game against the Yankees he struck Babe Ruth out three times, and in one inning fanned Ruth and Gehrig back to back.

What follows is the story of my father, Wallace “Preacher” Hebert, and his journey from the bayous of Louisiana to the merry-go-round of professional baseball in St. Louis, San Diego, and Pittsburgh, and back to the swamps of home—a ninety-two-year romp through the Twentieth Century.

My progress so far: I’m about halfway through the 1943 season in Pittsburg. My goal is to finish it up by next weekend. My goal for a finished first draft is the end of July when I leave for the writer’s retreat in Texas on the twenty-ninth. It’s not going to happen, but I’m getting closer. My publication goal for Flea Fest at Burton in November is still on. I’ll have to work extra long and hard. I’m sharing with my readers today part of an article about the move from sunny California to wintry Indiana below.

Wally Hebert quit the sunshine of California at the end of his 1942 Padre season in September and headed for the swamps and bayous of his Louisiana home. Before he left California he told the boys of the press that he had no intention of returning to the coast in the spring of 1943 if the war was still going on.

What he didn’t know was that he might be drafted by the Pirates—which happened in November. What he also didn’t know at the time was the Pirates had already announced they would be training at El Centro if it did not interfere with the war effort. It’s not clear what happened between November and March, but the press reported the Pirates were headed for Muncie, Indiana, for spring training. The Lake Charles paper reported Hebert was to leave on March 16 for training.

When they gathered in Muncie to bask under sun lamps instead of the California sun, manager Frankie Frisch would have thirty-four players to start spring training, provided everyone’s military status remained unchanged. Fifteen of those were pitchers.

A bright development coming out of the early workouts had to do with the oldest recruit on the squad—Wally Hebert 35-year-old former Padre. Frisch didn’t expect to see him report in such shape as to be able to fire his fast ball in drills during the first week.

Temperatures were down around freezing when the manager assembled the squad for their workout. The thermometer climbed about ten points when batting practice got under way. Hebert took over the mound for about fifteen  minutes, and he had the batters swinging—and missing—most of the time, especially the lefties among them. Indeed, they were more than happy when Frisch replaced the “veteran rookie.”