1961 FOOTBALL INDUCTEE JOHNNY BAKER Johnny Baker, an outstanding athlete at Kingsburg High School, etched his name in USC Trojan football history books in 1931 when he booted a thirty-three yard field goal to beat Notre Dame in South Bend and end a twenty- six game Irish win streak. The victory propelled the once-beaten Trojans…
1960 GOLF INDUCTEE CHARLES SEAVER Charles Seaver was the finest amateur golfer to ever call Fresno home. He was a good friend, a gentleman, and a links legend in California. For years, Seaver was a Northern California Golf Association official before becoming president of that group in 1980. He was a Walker Cup golfer at…
1960 ATHLETIC ADMINISTRATOR INDUCTEE EMORY RATCLIFFE Although his own playing career ended nearly six decades ago, Emory Ratcliffe has probably made the greatest contribution of any one man to athletics at Fresno State College. As the organizer and coach of many of Fresno State’s early athletic teams, as coach (for a brief period) of FSC’s…
1960 BASEBALL INDUCTEE ‘DUTCH” LEONARD Hubert “Dutch”Leonard experienced a baseball season in 1914 that modern day major league pitchers can only dream about. The Ohio native who was raised in Fresno forged a win/loss record of 19-5 for the second place Boston Red Sox, but that wasn’t the eye-popping statistic. What really turned heads was…
1960 TRACK & FIELD INDUCTEE RAFER JOHNSON Fresno County native, Rafer Johnson won gold and silver medals in the Olympic Games decathlon, but his legacy will include being one of the founders and ongoing leaders of the Special Olympics. Johnson, a very giving person, was on the original board that created the Special Olympics in…
1959 TRACK & FIELD INDUCTEE “DUTCH” WARMERDAM Cornelius “Dutch” Warmerdam was one of the most humble, self-effacing athletic greats that anyone could ever meet. His close friend, Payton Jordan, who was a top sprinter at USC and later an outstanding track and field coach at Stanford University, made this statement: “Dutch was the truest and…
1959 AUTO RACING INDUCTEE BILLY VUKOVICH Billy Vukovich Sr., a child of the Great Depression who helped his mother and siblings after his father died, grew up to be one of the most fearless and talented drivers to ever conquer the famed Indianapolis 500 Brickyard. Although the media called Vukovich the “Mad Russian” which he…
1959 FOOTBALL INDUCTEE LES RICHTER Leslie Allan Richter holds the distinction of being the only professional football player to ever be traded for an entire eleven-man team. With today’s inflated salaries and signing bonuses for rookies, it will never happen again. His roots were in Fresno where he was an All-Valley blocking back and linebacker…
1959 TRACK & FIELD INDUCTEE WALTER MARTY How could a youngster whom the Mono Indians nicknamed “Panther Foot” evolve into a world record high jumper? First, there was coaching by Julius Trombetta at Fresno High School where Walter Marty burst onto the scene and out-classed all of the Warrior high jumpers. At that time, he…
1959 BOXING INDUCTEE YOUNG CORBETT III The name, Raffaele Capabianca Giordano, would have been too much of a mouthful for boxing fans to say, so the Italian-born, Fresno-raised newsboy was dubbed Young Corbett III when he entered the ring as an amateur. Corbett is the only Fresnan to ever hold a world boxing title, winning…