New Ulm Sports Central - Preserving and Sharing New Ulm Area Sports History

Photo is of Darwin Berg at left and Al Zdon, secretary of the Minnesota Legion baseball program and editor of the "Legionnaire" state newspaper.

Several of the state Legion baseball tournament staff have New Ulm area connections and strong memories of baseball "as it once was."

Darwin Berg, the state director for the extensive Minnesota program, grew up in Winthrop and later moved to the Chaska area. He vividly recalls rushing home after church, grabbing a quick bite and hurrying down to the ball park in Winthrop. The goal was to park the family car along the foul line fences "before those people from New Ulm got up here." Those were the days of the Western Minnesota League as Berg recalls the community's struggles to find ways to bring in college and professional players as competition heats up. He recalls Winthrop having Oklahoma, "and even Hawaii players" getting part-time jobs in the small town ... jobs that were hard to really justify but it made for great fan interest. He credits Armin Schuette for providing lots of jobs for players when maybe it hurt his own business interests.

Milo Berg of Lafayette was his uncle and remembers Vernonica Berg and their son Donan. Veronica worked for the New Ulm Daily Journal as did Donan later in his growing up years. Donan actually broke his leg in a Media softball tournament game at Johnson Park when over 1,000 turned out to watch the media personnel in competition. He was playing for the Journal team.

Visiting with Berg, it's easy to understand his dedication to making the state organization of workers to serve the program rather than have the program serve their interests. "We do a lot of things as courtesy to the coaches and teams rather than simply enforcing rules," explains.

One of the photographers moving around the diamond is John Sherman, sports editor for the Sun Newspapers of the metro area. (He usually has his cap on backwards). His connection? He is a distant relative and knows of Bill "Teddy Bear" Sherman who came to New Ulm in the late 40's as an untested young pitcher out of Notre Dame but who found his way into the hearts of the local baseball fans. Bill went from a wild pitcher and hitter to pretty decent status. When he came he couldn't find the strike zone most of the time and when he batted, he seldom found the baseball. But in time, those changed much to the joy of those Brewer fans of the day.