When baseball superstar Hank Aaron died last week, I remembered his 1985 visit to Natchitoches and Northwestern for a Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame induction.
Aaron’s 755 career home runs stood as a Major League record for three decades and still rank him second all-time on that list.
All those homers and a lifetime .305 batting average earned Aaron the nickname “Hammerin’ Hank,” but I learned to call him Mr. Aaron the day he came to town.
The appearance here by Aaron, who spent nearly all of his big league career with the Braves in Milwaukee and Atlanta, was to introduce Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame inductee Ralph Garr.
Garr, a Monroe native who played at Grambling, was in the same outfield with Aaron for a few years in Atlanta.
I was director of the Louisiana Sports Hall of Fame in those days and master of ceremonies for the induction banquets.
It took me a while to run Garr down to inform him that he had been elected to the Hall of Fame. He had retired from baseball and was part-owner of a donut shop in Houston.
But he had just signed on as a scout with the Braves. His former teammate Aaron, the team’s director of player development at the time, hired him to scout and coach in the minor leagues.
Inductees into the Louisiana Hall select the person they want to introduce them. When I told Garr that, he said he would probably get someone from Grambling and would let me know.
He called a few days later with the bombshell news that Hank Aaron would be here to introduce him. Garr gave me Aaron’s phone number, and I called him to verify his attendance at the event.
Tickets sold out the day after we announced that Aaron, who had gone into the Hall of Fame in Cooperstown three years earlier, would be on the program.
My friend Tom Murchison, maybe the most avid baseball fan in town who always attended the inductions, called for extra tickets and asked about meeting Aaron.
A Missouri native and lifelong St. Louis Cardinals disciple, Tom said he would not even mention the Cardinals if he had a chance to visit with Aaron, a Braves icon.
We got Tom a few minutes with Aaron, who told me later in amusement that Murchison recited him the history of the St. Louis Cardinals and barely mentioned the Braves.
Aaron made a whirlwind trip to Natchitoches to be on the program, but he was gracious and accommodating and just a class act in every way.
Joe Sampite, the mayor at the time who was known for slapping I Love Natchitoches stickers on everybody he met, put one on the lapel of Aaron’s nice summer suit, and Aaron wore it all night.
In mentioning Aaron a couple of times during the program and later inviting him to the podium to introduce Garr, I called him Hank as I had done during our phone conversations.
In his acceptance speech, Garr continually referred to him as “Mr. Aaron,” and even addressed him as “Mr. Aaron” when he spoke directly to him on the stage.
Hank Aaron was baseball royalty. He had surpassed Babe Ruth’s career home run record a decade earlier and still held the “Home Run King” title at that time. And here was Ralph Garr, an ex-teammate, calling him Mr. Aaron.
When I got back to the microphone, I told Hank Aaron a few seats away with the capacity crowd in the ballroom listening, “Mr. Aaron, I want to apologize for calling you Hank.”
In phone conversations as a follow-up to the event, I never addressed him in any other way than “Mr. Aaron.” He always laughed and said, “I’d rather you just call me Hank.”
REPRINTED FROM THE NATCHITOCHES TIMES