Taking a look at Cedar Rapids’ rich softball history
Community: First in a five-part series
By Bill Johnson, community contributor
Bill Johnson is a Cedar Rapids historian who spent 30 years working for the U.S. Navy. This is the first of a five-part series on softball in Cedar Rapids.
At times it seems there always is a softball game going on somewhere in Cedar Rapids between late spring and early autumn.
Kids, adults, athletes and folks just out for some fun, all play on teams and leagues that serve as competitive outlets and allow them to enjoy the sport.
The story of softball in Cedar Rapids, however, is much richer than just this evening’s game. In the glory days of the 1960s and ’70s and ’80s, Cedar Rapids was a hotbed of fast-pitch softball and routinely sent teams and players to the most elite levels of national and world championship competition. There was a time not long ago when grandstands that held more than 5,000 people enveloped a single softball diamond at Ellis Park, and there were nights when cheering fans filled those stands for a men’s Major Open fast-pitch doubleheader.
In 1971, Cedar Rapids’ own Welty Way-sponsored team was crowned Amateur Softball Association (ASA) national champions, and many of the players on that team ranked among the very best in the world. In 1987, Teleconnect repeated the feat, capturing the International Softball Congress World Championship in Saskatoon, Saskatchewan.
Click here to read the complete article (Part 1/5)
Click here to see photo of several members of the 1987 Teleconnect fast-pitch softball team got back together in 2002 for a 15-year anniversary story. The players here are (back to front) Leroy Wegmann, Steve Anderson, Kevin Hartwig, Phil Lala, Mike Tranel and Kurt Packingham. (Photo by The Gazette)