Category:Veterans

From BR Bullpen

These folk were Military Veterans, as identified by the Baseball and the Armed Forces Committee of the Society for American Baseball Research (SABR).

This information has been dug out of numerous sources including newspaper obituaries (OB), VA Hospital Records (VA), Miltary Cemetery websites (CM), Soldier & Sailors System (CW), Sporting Life (SL), The Sporting News (TSN), Stars&Stripes (S&S), the SABR BIOProject (BP), The Sports Encyclopedia:Baseball 2006 by David Neft & Richard Cohen (N&C), old Who's Who in Baseballs (WW), old Baseball Registers (BR), Commissioners Lists (CL), The Baseball Necrology (BN), Baseball in World War II Europe by Gary Bedingfield (GB), independent research by Walter Kephart and Frank Russo and others.

They are people who are military veterans and who were connected with baseball (players, managers, coaches, umpires, executives et al.) in the Major Leagues, minor Leagues, Negro Leagues, Japanese Leagues, AAGPBL, Hispanic and Amateur Leagues (prior to 1871), identified by the Baseball and the Armed Forces Committee of the Society of American Baseball Research (SABR).

[edit] A NOTE ABOUT WHO IS INCLUDED IN WHICH WAR

Title 38 of the US Code as it applies to the Department of Veterans Affairs (formerly the VA or Veterans Administration) defines the dates of the various wars and that is what is used here

The dates they use for the US wars:

Spanish American War 4/21/1898 to 7/4/02
WW1 4/6/17 to 11/11/18
WW2 12/7/41 to 12/31/46
Korean Conflict 6/27/50 to 1/31/55
Viet Nam Era 8/5/64 to 5/7/75 except that anyone who served in the
Republic of Viet Nam from 2/28/61 to 8/5/64 is also included.

Accordingly we have made corresponding assumptions about the Mexican War, Civil War, Indian Wars, Boxer Rebellion, Mexican Border War and the conflicts of the last decade and a half.

Service during wartime does not imply combat experience or even service in a combat area. To be eligible as a war veteran the individual only has to have been in the armed service during those dates. If this is good enough for the VA it is good enough for us. In the interest of full disclosure I am a veteran of WW2 with service during those dates and worked for the VA for about 20 years. I know also from my experience that a service person does not usually have much choice about what he or she does in the service. You go and do what you are directed to do. This may be combat or it may be guard duty in Washington, DC. To imply that some one is not a veteran because he did not serve in the Pacific or Europe or Viet Nam is not accurate or fair.

Walter Kephart