Logan and Hannah Lowery stood outside the gates of Sal Maglie Stadium clutching a game program nearly 50 years old. The gates were locked, but they could picture their grandfather stepping into the batter’s box, fielding a ground ball and rounding the bases.
Jerome Yandrick is nearly 70 years old now, living in Latrobe, Pennsylvania, his baseball career long in the past. But his grandchildren, both under 10 years old, wanted to see where he spent the summer of 1976, as part of a trip to visit relatives in Niagara Falls on August 15-16.
He kicked around in the minor leagues for two seasons before opting for a career in construction, but Yandrick spent July and August 1976 playing first base for the Niagara Falls Pirates, then a Class A farm team of the Pittsburgh Pirates in the New York-Pennsylvania League. The Pirates folded in 1979 and the stadium was renamed from Hyde Park Stadium in 1983, but Yandrick’s grandchildren are ready to listen to stories about two months spent playing with a slew of future Major League Baseball Players.
“They had some extra time when they got up there, so they went straight to the ballpark and took the pictures,” Yandrick said. “At that time, they didn’t know that side of me… It was nice to see through their eyes, the field and the stadium. They go to the (Pittsburgh) Pirates games and they watch them on TV, but they’re more interested in the farm life. They enjoy that side of life, which is rare nowadays.”
Logan and Hannah saw their grandfather’s trading card from his time with the Charleston Patriots of the Western Carolinas League, where he played in 1977. But Logan wasn’t sure if the story of his grandfather playing in Niagara Falls was true or not.
But once he and his sister saw the diamond of Sal Maglie Stadium in person, it all connected. Since school resumed, the siblings shared the experience with their classes, with hopes of returning to Sal Maglie Stadium in the future to watch a game.
“I think that was their connection of, ‘Poppy played all the way up here,’” said Chelsey Lowery, one of Yandrick’s four children and Logan and Hannah’s mother. “We walked around to peek and my son saw first base… and (was) just kind of (in) awe, like, ‘Poppy was there and now I’m here.’ So it was just cool for them.”
Before he donned the black-and-orange colors, Yandrick didn’t know anything about Niagara Falls or the team. In fact, he wasn’t expecting to receive a call offering a chance to play for the Pirates at all.
Four Pirates went on to have lengthy MLB careers, including Rick Honeycutt, who pitched for six major league teams in 21 seasons, won 109 games, posted 1,038 strikeouts and notably helped Oakland win the World Series in 1989. Luis Salazar was an outfielder with Niagara Falls in the 1976 season and later played for four different teams in the major leagues and helped San Diego win the 1984 National League pennant, while pitcher Bob Long made two separate stints with Pittsburgh and Seattle in the 1980s and Willie Royster played in four games for Baltimore in 1981.
Yandrick had finished his college baseball career that went from Indiana University in Pennsylvania, Yavapai Junior College and then graduated at the University of North Carolina Wilmington in mid-May and played in a men’s league back home in Latrobe and Hostetter, Pennsylvania, when he received the call on July 9. The Pirates began their season on June 22 but needed another first baseman after he was diagnosed with nyctalopia.
The Pirates didn’t buy him a glove or cleats, but he was paid $500 per month, most of which went to his Niagara Falls apartment. But, it was an opportunity to play professional baseball.
He quickly discovered the Pirates were all business, led by manager Glenn Ezell, who coached in the MLB for 12 years and the minors for 13. Yandrick said Ezell was like a drill sergeant and the team mirrored him, although there wasn’t much of a push to do so on a team filled with players who wanted to make it to the big leagues.
“Glenn had an attitude about him,” Yandrick recalled. “When you come to the game, there was no clowning around. It was playing for keeps, and even practice, he wanted you to give 120% the whole time. I remember one player — I won’t mention his name — he didn’t hustle one time, and Glenn, he went after him like a dog. He let him know that he wouldn’t stand for that type of play and not not hustling.”
With Yandrick in the lineup, the Pirates finished third in the New York-Pennsylvania League with a 35-34 record. He recorded a .298 batting average, three home runs, 28 RBIs and 23 runs in 41 games.
The following summer, Yandrick played for Charleston, but couldn’t keep the momentum, calling the season “a shipwreck.” He hit .196 in 84 games, saying, “Pitchers knew I couldn’t hit a curveball.”
After that, Yandrick began a career as a bricklayer, pouring cement and putting in pipelines, among other jobs in the construction industry. Yet he still looks back on that summer in Niagara Falls with fondness.
“I felt like I belonged there,” Yandrick said. “... I played all through Little League, high school and college and I was headed towards the pros and finally reaching that level, there was definitely an adrenaline rush and excitement about going to the park. … That was the first time in my life anybody asked me for an autograph after the game. And it was a new experience.”
