Articles

PRO PLAYER’S TALE HEARTENS COACH’S SON 

By ED RUNYAN, Staff Writer, Warren, OH Tribune, Chronicle, May 4, 2024, p. 1.

MECCA (OH)— It’s hard to overstate how much Scott Chronister of Champion responded to the story in last weekend’s Tribune Chronicle about Helen Snyder, who played in the final season of the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League in 1954.

Snyder’s last name was Y’Barbo when she played, and she garnered the nickname “Tex” because that was where she lived before moving to the area to finish high school.

The story included a photo of Snyder, 88, surrounded by jerseys she wore during her years of playing softball for several “town teams” in Trumbull County after her professional season with the South Bend Blue Sox and then the Kalamazoo Lassies. Cortland and Hubbard jerseys were shown.

Chronister had never met Snyder, but he called her last weekend after reading the story and “seeing the picture in the paper and instantly connecting with that jersey and knowing what it meant to my grandfather,” Chronister said. 

Chronister’s grandfather, Ray Barto, had coached Snyder on the Cortland team.

Barto was a World War II veteran who served in the Pacific and came home to Trumbull County and went to work at General Motors. He then became interested in coaching girls softball. He had pitched and played sports before his military service, Chronister said.

The news article also included a team photo from the Cortland “town team” on which Snyder played. It showed Snyder and another player holding a trophy. Among the people in the team photo are Chronister’s grandfather, Ray Barto, his wife, Hazel, who kept the scorebook; and Ray’s sister, Grace Flowers.

“The reason that kind of resonated with me so much is he always just lit up when he talked about those teams, and my grandfather wasn’t the type to light up about a bunch of stuff, but he was convinced he was going to make my mom the next Tex Y’Barbo,” he said. 

Chronister said his grandfather would make Chronister’s mom throw 100 pitches into a tire swing every night. Unfortunately, it didn’t end up working out for her. So, Barto taught Chronister and his brother as well.

“He would always talk about Tex Y’Barbo and how the mitt would pop when she threw it,” Chronister said. “So we grew up hearing about Tex Y’Barbo and the mitt popping and just always heard stories about her as he was attempting to teach my mom, and then me and my brother, to pitch.”

Barto, who died in 2006, taught Chronister to pitch in the 1980s and 1990s — about 30 years after Barto coached Snyder.

“Her name is kind of ingrained in our childhood, learning how to pitch and very special memories. So when I saw (the Tribune Chronicle photos), there was that instant connection to that jersey and that story,” Chronister said.

Chronister had seen the team photo before, so to see it again in the story with relatives of his and Snyder was special.

“When I look at that picture, there are three relatives there … and that name Tex Y’Barbo was spoken so much in my house, so much with my grandparents, talking about those days with the softball, I couldn’t believe it when I saw the picture,” Chronister said.

PRESS CLIPPINGS

A few clippings from the Tribune Chronicle from the 1950s and 1960s showed that Snyder was a successful pitcher.

One describes a no-hitter she threw against the HiWay Area team in an 11-0 Cortland win at Perkins Park in Warren. Three batters reached base for HiWay — one when Snyder “fumbled” a ground ball, one when she hit a batter and another runner who reached base on an error. Snyder struck out 11 batters.

In a game against Howland, Snyder struck out 14 in a 15-6 Cortland win at Perkins Park. She also helped her team with a triple and a single, a news clipping states.

“To hear her tell those stories in person was great. I couldn’t thank them (Snyder and her caretaker) enough for taking the time to talk to me,” Chronister said. 

According to Chronister, Snyder told him his grandfather “treated them well. It took her a second. I said ‘I am Ray Barto’s grandson.’ She said ‘Who?’ Then she said ‘Oh, he treated us really, really well. He was a good coach.”

Chronister said he has a lot of memorabilia from his grandfather and contacted Snyder after reading the article to see if she would consider making her Cortland jersey available for him to acquire some day. She was open to the idea.

Chronister is a teacher in the Lakeview Local Schools. He said he values stories about his relatives and how they lived in the 1950s and 1960s. 

“It was a chance to bring back a piece of his history to me,” Chronister said of his conversation with Snyder.

HELEN IN THE PROS

The day before the story ran in the Tribune Chronicle, Carol Sheldon of Royal Oak, Michigan, a director of the All American Girls Professional Baseball League Players Association and chairwoman of the archives and memorabilia committee, responded to a request for information about Snyder. She said she had recently obtained a 1954 Kalamazoo Lassies scorecard with Snyder’s name listed as a rookie on the South Bend team.

The scorecard contained the names of all of the players from all five teams in the league. It listed Snyder as a “rookie.” 

Sheldon said Snyder is not listed on the official roster of the league, but because she has Snyder’s’s name on an official scorecard, Snyder’s name will be added to the official roster.

“The fact that she is on a scorecard from the season, that’s going to solidify the fact that she was a bona fide player in the league,” Sheldon said.

Sheldon also provided the Tribune Chronicle with a photo of clippings from the Kalamazoo Gazette, including a June 4, 1954, article about Snyder being acquired by the Kalamazoo Lassies.

The article called Snyder “a rookie from Warren, O. An outfielder, Helen will get a good look before the Lassies go away Sunday.” The Lassies drew a paid attendance of 57,000 during the 1953 season, the Kalamazoo article stated. The Lassies won the final championship of the league in 1954.

Snyder said she remembers she was mostly a “fill-in” at second base and shortstop but remembers playing outfield just one time for the Lassies and was concerned about it because she had never played outfield before.

Sheldon was having no luck finding a Lassies box score listing Snyder, she said. Another criteria that can be used to verify that someone was a player in the league is a boxscore showing the person’s name.

The Tribune Chronicle was able to locate one of those through its research on Newspapers.com. It was with a May 24,1954, article in the Sidney Daily News of Sidney, Ohio, near Dayton. It was an exhibition game between the Blue Sox and Fort Wayne Daisies several days before league play started.

It listed “Y’Barbo” playing second base and getting up to bat twice with no hits in a South Bend 8-4 victory.

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