Did you know that our grandfathers — brothers Harry and Joseph Mattimore — were big-time star athletes in their day? I didn’t. Maybe that’s because my grandfather Joe died in 1964 when I was only six years old. Even his oldest grandchild, my cousin Anne Cronin, would have only been about 10 years old at that time.

Hopefully Harry’s grandkids had more of a sense of their grandfather’s life since Harry was 86 years old when he passed away in 1981. By then my cousins were older, too, and may have heard stories of Harry’s sporting days.

When researching the blog post about my grandmother Mary Mattimore a couple of years ago, I learned that my grandfather Joe played professional baseball for a minor league team while living in Hibbing, Minnesota. I had never heard that before, and so I decided to see if I could find old newspaper clips to piece together some sort of story about our athlete grandfathers.

Both brothers enjoyed golf and bowling into their later years. But back in school and in their 20s? Harry played basketball, baseball, golf and was an officer for the Canisius College Athletic Association. Joe Mattimore ran track, played golf, baseball and helped organize Knights of Columbus marathons. That’s only what I could find, too.

But without a doubt, the starring roles for Harry and Joe were basketball and baseball respectively. Harry played both forward and guard while Joe was a pitcher.

[Note: This post includes just a sampling of the clips I found.]

I am also reminded of seeing an old note of Harry’s where he wrote that on December 10, 1916, he had dislocated his kneecap for the fourth time. My reaction years ago at seeing this note was “What?!” I couldn’t imagine how someone only 21 years old had dislocated a kneecap, let alone done it four times by that young age. Well, learning more about him and knowing he was an athlete, it makes much more sense as athletes are often prone to injuries. Seems like that mystery is solved.

I can also now picture in my head Aunt Kate watching and cheering on “her boys,” at their games — and feeling very proud.

Post Note: If you know any more info about Harry and Joe and their athletic days, add it in the comments!