HOUSE RESOLUTION NO. 38

BY  WATTS, KELLEY, BALTIMORE, and SWAIM

A Resolution celebrating baseball and baseball’s greatest in Iowa.

   WHEREAS, springtime has come again to Iowa, bringing with it another season of baseball; and
   WHEREAS, as another season opens we pause to remember two remarkable Iowans who dedicated themselves to the game, first cousins Bob Feller of Van Meter and Hal Manders of Waukee; and
   WHEREAS, as kids Bob Feller, Nile Kinnick, and Hal Manders all played on the same Junior Legion Baseball Team; and
   WHEREAS, Hal Manders was born in 1917, and studied medicine at the University of Iowa and pitched for the Hawkeyes, but chose baseball over medicine and was a relief pitcher in major league baseball in the 1940s, playing for the Detroit Tigers and the Chicago Cubs; and
   WHEREAS, Mr. Manders returned home in 1946 and farmed the rich soils of Dallas County for the rest of his life, working as a community leader and a rural development advisor to President Ronald Reagan; and
   WHEREAS, Bob Feller was born in 1918, actually pitched his first professional game before he was a senior in high school, and spent his entire professional career of 18 years with the Cleveland Indians, and in 1962 as “the Heater from Van Meter”, was inducted into the baseball Hall of Fame; and
   WHEREAS, Mr. Feller put his career aside to serve his country, volunteering immediately for combat service following the attack on Pearl Harbor, and becoming the first major league baseball player to do so; and
   WHEREAS, both have passed away in 2010, Mr. Manders on January 21, and Mr. Feller on December 15, with Mr. Manders remembered at the Manders Museum Wing in the Waukee Public Library, and Mr. Feller memorialized at the Bob Feller Museum in Van Meter; and
   WHEREAS, both of these Iowans live on through the game they loved, as each springtime introduces a new generation of youngsters to baseball, fans fill the bleachers, and players take the field; NOW THEREFORE,

   BE IT RESOLVED BY THE HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES, That the House of Representatives celebrates the coming of spring and another baseball season, and celebrates the memory of Iowa greats Bob Feller and Hal Manders.