(Story by Marco Stoovelaar; Photos by Robur '58 & Marco Stoovelaar)
IN MEMORIAM
...Joes Gewald...
(1933 - 2024)
(© Photo: Robur '58) |
 Robur '58 club-icon and former umpire Joes Gewald passed away
Nederlands
 APELDOORN (Neth.) -
Joes Gewald, who was a very recognizable club-icon of Apeldoorn-based baseball- and softball-club Robur '58, passed away on Thursday, February 22 at age 90.
Joes Gewald was closely involved with Robur '58 since the early seventies and also been active for WSB, another club from Apeldoorn.
Besides being a very active club-contributor, he also has been a baseball- and softball-umpire for some 20 years and officiated a few seasons on the national level.
He also has been an umpire-observer for more than ten years.
Joes Gewald was born on June 15, 1933 in Arnhem, but was associated for more than fifty years at Apeldoorn-based club Robur '58 and later also was involved at WSB.
Since 1966, he worked for 33 years at Eastman Kodak Company, which was based in the Utrecht-area.
When Joes Gewald joined Robur '58, he became part of a club that developed into a very active one, especially in the central and eastern part of the country.
Since 1989, Robur '58 organized many editions of the Apeldoorn Baseball Series, an international youth baseball-tournament, which later was expanded with a softball-tournament.
Six years ago, the club stopped hosting these events.
At Robur '58, Joes Gewald quickly became involved in all kind of club-activities.
He became a member of several committees, led the club for many years as chairman and was the longtime, entertaining Public Address Announcer at the home-games of the Robur '58 baseball-team, as well as during the before-mentioned tournament.
Joes would be the club's main announcer for many seasons.
When he retired as announcer, Joes would accomany his successors.
One of them was the talented and enthousiastic Vilmos Pluim, who also was a presenter of some local digital programs.
Unfortunately, Vilmos passed away unexpectedly during a vacation in Switzerland in August 2008.
He was only 20 years old.
Joes also coached many youth baseball-teams.
Another wellknown youth-coach at Robur for many years was Dick de Vries, the father of future big league- and National Team-pitchers Carel de Vries and Eric de Vries.
Because of all his activities, Joes became very well known in the Apeldoorn-region and surrounding areas.
But he later also became known on other sites, as he was an umpire for many years.
Robur '58 became one of the biggest and most successful clubs in the region and plays its home-games at Sportpak 'Orderbos', which is one of the most beautiful complexes in the country.
The club plays at site since 1972 and moved there shortly after Joes had joined the club.
Through the years, since the seventies, Joes Gewald became of several active members, including Aad Laurens, Joop van Hattem, Egbert van der Sluis, Reinhold Jahn, Annie Kerkhof, Jeroen Bockweg, Hennie de Roos, Jacob Brons, Wil van Beek, Gerard van Beek, Jan Grefhorst, Hans Kunnen and Jan Kuipers.
The latter later succeeded Gewald as chairman.
Halfway the eighties, Reinhold Jahn, who passed away in 2005 at the much too young age of 54, was one of the initiative-takers who created the Apeldoorn Baseball Series, which had its first edition in 1989.
The tournament ended in 2018 after thirty editions.
Since halfway the eighties, Annie Kerkhof (who passed away in November 2022) became a very active administrator as the club's administrator.
In the years that followed, Robur '58 began working more and more closely with WSB, where Henny Jansen was chairman for several years.
Later, Jansen became chairman of Rayon Het Oosten.
Other wellknown active members of WSB through the years were Henk Kip, Jan van 't Ende and Enno Diekema.
Other active personalities in Rayon Het Oosten in these years include Jan van de Vegte, Leo Groen, Jesse Maduro, Hennie Brand, Jan van der Molen, Wibo de Boer and Ad Roos.
...The baseball-statue at the home-site...
...of Robur '58 in Apeldoorn...
(© Photo: Marco Stoovelaar) |
Besides all his club-activities, Joes Gewald also has been a longtime game-official.
He was a baseball- and/or softball-umpire for some 20 years between 1975 and 1995 with the exception of two seasons.
In this first six seasons as an umpire, Gewald officiated both baseball and softball in what was then Rayon Het Oosten (Rayon East).
Amongst his umpiring colleagues in those years at the Rayon-level were Hennie Brand, Vincent Hazel, Rob de Jong, Henk Meerleveld, Jan van der Molen, Leo Poorthuis and Piet van Rossum.
From this group, Hazel and Meerleveld became umpires in the Dutch baseball big league.
In 1980, Joes Gewald became the chairman of the Umpiring Committee in Rayon Het Oosten.
He led this committee for three years, then was a member in 1983 after being succeeded by Henk Meerleveld.
Other committee-members included Piet van Rossum (secretary), Mario Figaroa and Egbert van der Sluis.
The latter became a member of the board of the Dutch Federation for several years, handling softball-affairs.
In 1981 and 1982, Joes Gewald was an umpire in baseball-games on the national level, but he returned to the Rayon in 1983.
In that season, as well as in 1984, he was an umpire in softball-games.
Next, Joes officiated solely baseball-games in the Rayon in 1985-1989.
Amongst his new umpiring colleagues in the Rayon since 1983 were John Beltman, Enno Diekema, Vincent Figaroa, Henny Jansen, Hans Leenen, Ben van Meerkerk, Gilbert Peloz, Henk Reuvekamp, Rob van Rossum, Egbert van der Sluis, Cor Veraar and Loek Winkeler.
From this group, Beltman, Jansen and Leenen later became umpires in the Dutch baseball big league.
Beltman, who made his debut in the Rayon in 1990, is one of the current big league-umpires.
Peloz, Reuvekamp, Van Rossum and Veraar all went on to officiate in the softballl big league in later seasons.
Joes Gewald initially retired as an umpire after the 1989 season, but he came back and added four more seasons (1992-1995) in both baseball and softball in what then was District Oost, which was created in 1992 and combined the Rayons of Het Oosten (East) and Midden-Nederland (Central Netherlands).
Although he retired thereafter, Joes frequently kept putting on his umpiring costume in following years to officiate youth-games of his club Robur '58, which he did at a high age.
Since 1991, Gewald also was one of the national umpiring observers (nowadays called technical commissioners), a position, he held through 2003.
In these thirteen seasons, other known observers (some for a few years, others longer) were Erick Barkhuis, Paul Bokern, Cees Bouterse, Willem Broertjes, Jos de Champs, Nico Dalmulder, Henk Ebbing, Gerben Hardeveld, Joop van Hattem, Vincent Hazel, Ton Hout, Bram Klijnsmit, Fred de Kramer, Henk Meerleveld, André Schrijber, Gerrit Sluijters, Piet Sterk, Coen Stoovelaar, Wil Tessers, Karel van Veen, Joop van Wendel de Joode and Henk Wolffenbuttel.
From this group are Bokern and Sterk still active as observer/commissisoner.
...Joes Gewald continued to umpire...
...youth-games of Robur '58 at a high age...
(© Private-photo) |
In his first two years as an umpire-observer (1991-1992), Joes also observed umpires on the Rayon-level.
Other Rayon-observers then included Gerrie Jansen-van Drunen, Henk Meerleveld, Hennie de Roos, Piet van Rossum and Loek Winkeler.
From this group, Hennie de Roos had been an umpire in the softball big league, while Gerrie Jansen-van Drunen, the mother of Henny Jansen, had been an official scorer in the Dutch big league for some seasons.
In a long In Memoriam on its facebook-page Robur '58 honors Joes Gewald and mentions that, according to the club-archives, he first became involved in the club in 1971.
In later years, he would become chairman of the club, committee-member and was the Public Address Announcer for the home-games of the main baseball-team of Robur 58.
Besides doing the announcing during the baseball-games, Joes also was behind the microphone during the international Apeldoorn Baseball Series.
In its In Memoriam, Robur '58 states that Joes Gewald had been an accomplished musician, had performed on stage and loved music, especially jazz.
With this background, he became a member of the club's Events Committee and he quickly felt at home behind the microphone, announcing the games.
During the games, he shared his baseball-knowledge, as well as his favorite music.
As he used his own music, some younger players later brought cassette-tapes or CD's with their own tastes of music.
After he decided to stop as announcer, he placed a notice in the club-magazine of the time: Wanted an announcer for the home games of baseball-1 and other events such as The Series.
The requirements are: being able to be present regularly, lack of fear of heights (there was a glorified tree house high up in the backstop instead of the current speaker tower), civilized voice, impartial, even in the event of a loss, (and now it comes) playing cheerful music and having some knowledge of baseball.
His regular opening at the Series was often: “Ladies and gentlemen, a warm welcome to our sun-drenched Robur '58 site…”.
All this ensured that a a new generation of young announcers emerged who accompanied the games and the Series, often under the supervision of Joes.
Robur's lookback to the life of Joes Gewald also mentions that in 2006, he wrote an umpiring course, which enabled youth-members of the club to officiate games.
It was also written that Joes loved to talk often about baseball.
He knew a lot of the game and wanted to share his love for the sport with others.
The club also says that as chairman, he witnessed the growth and glory of the Robur '58-club up close.
In 1999, he was a member of the “Evaluation Committee” to tackle the administrative problems and then he 'recruited' Jan Kuipers, who became the new chairman.
Robur '58 memorizes that Joes was very proud of his family and enjoyed it very much attending games played by his grandchildren at both Robur '58 and WSB.
Despite some physical and health problems, Joes remained a frequent visitor at the sites of Robur '58 and WSB.
Robur '58 closes its In Memoriam with the following:
,,The baseball-virus will stay in the family, meanig that part of Joes' legacy will never be lost!''
The webmaster of Grand Slam * Stats & News offers his condolences to Joes' family and friends and wishes them a lot of strength with this big loss.
(March 1)
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