By Brian Ojanpa
The Free Press
June 09, 2007 10:01 pm
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Claire Faust’s personal dossier is flush with civic and career achievements:
Former Mankato City Council member, served on the Blue Earth County Environmental Committee, was a Minnesota State professor and later a university vice president.
The list goes on, even as your eyes glaze over. Sorry, Claire. As they say, no good deed goes unyawned over. Or something like that.
But then the 86-year-old can hit you with this — “I got a hit off Bob Feller in high school” — and your head snaps to attention.
Faust didn’t blow his own horn on this — one of his friends called in the info — but anyone hereabouts who can say he got a hit off one of the game’s greatest pitchers is in impressively singular company.
“I was just elated over what I did. I was ecstatic,” Faust recalls.
The tip about Faust’s feat came after Feller’s Mankato appearance a few days ago at the Mankato MoonDogs home opener.
The Hall of Famer created a buzz at Franklin Rogers Park, but nothing like the stir he caused in his hometown Van Meter, Iowa, long ago when he made a triumphant return following his debut season with the Cleveland Indians.
“They had this big celebration. Parade, community dinner; they had the works,” recalls Faust, who grew up on a farm near Winterset, Iowa, about 12 miles away.
Like Faust, Feller was still just a kid himself, returning to tiny Van Meter for his final year of high school.
A ballgame was held that day as part of the festivities. It was an exhibition affair, with Feller pitching against about 30 young ballplayers from throughout the area.
“They wanted everyone to get in on the act, so we all played about one inning,” says Faust, who had formulated a plan for when he came to bat.
“We knew he had a blazing fastball, and also a tendency to hit people once in awhile. But I wanted to stand up to him. I made up my mind that I wasn’t going to flinch.”
Faust stepped into the batter’s box and watched Feller’s first bullet go by.
Feller wound up and fired another.
“I just stuck out my bat. It was a fastball right down the middle, and the ball went right over the second baseman’s head.”
There weren’t many hits off Feller that day. In fact, Faust thinks he may have had the only one.
The Faust dossier includes his work with the Mankato Kiwanis Club, authorship of a book chronicling the first 25 years of Mankato State University, the list continues to go on. All worthy pursuits, all eminently laudable.
And, arguably, every one more doable than a middling-talent teenage ballplayer getting a hit off Rapid Robert.
Brian Ojanpa is a Free Press staff writer. Call him at 344-6316 or e-mail bojanpa@mankatofreepress.com.
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