Sidelines: Horrell, one heavy hitter

Don Cantrell

Boyd “Boggie” Horrell was the heaviest hitting batter on the only

championship baseball team ever to play at Newport Harbor High over a

period of 70 years. He still rings a bell with yesteryear fans who

cheered for him in several sports.

His good health had kept him going for many years, but he has been

slowed down of late, since his doctor ordered him to cart a small oxygen

tank around.

Horrell, always a hard worker at any task, never smoked cigarettes,

but unfortunately his lungs have set him back because an old problem has

returned to bother him.

Years back, he worked on major pipeline projects underground and at

one point he absorbed some foul fumes from the soil. It never seemed to

bother him in prior years.

Pilot Hall of Famer Bill Clark, Horrell’s old friend and 1947 Harbor

grid teammate, said Horrell visited Newport recently and found time to

meet with his ’48 champ baseball teammate, Bill Weatherwax.

Horrell still runs a quality farm in Somerton, Ariz., but still wishes

for a day to shift to a cool, breezy place like San Diego.

One amusing thing is that no one seems to know how he ever got the

nickname of “Boggie.” Also, most old friends never spell the nickname the

same way and Horrell never corrects them.

We once saw him with a four-year letterman’s sweater and assumed it

was for football or baseball.

We were wrong. The sweater was for four years of varsity basketball,

but in the end, his big marks came in football and baseball.

Horrell, who knew how to laugh at himself, once had a sharp reply for

the ’42 Harbor High student body president, Ed Stephens.

Stephens said he was amazed to see Horrell wearing his ’48 letterman’s

sweater at the 25-year football reunion in 1989. Horrell told this

corner, “Well, he never saw me try to button it, did he?”

Horrell once sprang loose as a tough linebacker to catch Fullerton’s

speedy Bob Osborne one foot from the goal just before halftime. Fans were

amazed, but Horrell laughed when reflecting on himself as a “Clydesdale.”

When lauded again, Horrell finally said, “Yeah, but I had a good angle on

him.”

He drew ample praise one afternoon at an Orange Coast College grid

practice when line coach Johnny Owens cheered him and the late Rod Gould

for great defensive play.

In all, he played four years of sports at Harbor High and two years at

OCC, where he made All-Eastern Conference in football and helped guide

OCC to its first baseball championship in 1949, one year after

contributing to the Tars’ first diamond title.

Two others who helped coach Wendell Pickens to his first OCC baseball

title were former Tars Bill “Dutch” Van Horn and pitcher Bob Nettles.

Horrell also helped Pickens lay out and construct the first backstop

and diamond at OCC.

Horrell has always spoken highly of his teammates and coaches at

Harbor and OCC. His OCC grid mark in history came in ’48 when he booted

the first extra point for the Pirates while Harbor teammate, Brian

Hanzal, scored the first-ever Pirate touchdown against Riverside.

One of Horrell’s brightest highlights over the years was being invited

with three other athletes to a grand 50th wedding anniversary for Pickens

on a big yacht in the harbor. Harold Sheflin, the legendary ’42 fullback

at Newport, was one of those invited and that pleased Horrell “very much

since Harold was my idol throughout boyhood years.”

Another prized highlight came at Fort Ord during his Army years. One

afternoon he got a call from Capt. Zeller Robertson, a ’40 Newport grad,

who invited him out to dinner in nearby Monterey. Enlisted men were not

always free to leave base. But Robertson was a captain and that helped.

During the Korean War, Horrell was a Browning Automatic Rifle Army

sergeant during the combat times. He was never into chatting about the

rugged war experiences.

One of his biggest hits in baseball came against invading San Diego in

a CIF playoff contest at Lions field in Costa Mesa. Horrell hit a superb

home run over the fence and gave Newport something to cheer about since

the team finally lost, 5-1, to San Diego.

Like most old-time fans and players, Horrell still points high acclaim

to catcher Bill Weatherwax and southpaw pitcher Frank Hamilton for

leading the Sailors to the baseball championship in ’48.

One of the big stars in his life was his father, a noted dory

fisherman in Newport for many years. His dad is the one who consistently

collected his photos and stories to build a set of scrapbooks.