Baseball Victoria Hall of Fame Administrators: Ron Clack
Ron Clack was a stalwart of regional Victorian baseball and an administrator who promoted baseball in Ballarat and the regions and was known as ‘Mr Baseball’. Ron began as scorer for the YMCA Club in 1931 at age 13 and played a few seasons with YMCA. He transferred to City and played for 11 seasons in 1938 & 1939 until World War II and then rejoined after the War in 1946 and played until 1954 (with a few games filling in up until around 1965).
He played around 240 games. He captained the A Grade team for 2 seasons and the 2nds for the last few seasons of his career. He coached juniors from around 1960 until 1966. He was Club Treasurer and Vice-President from 1947 to1956 and President from 1957 to 1972. He played in and later coached many Ballarat Senior and Junior Queen’s Birthday weekend Carnival teams.
In 1973 he was made a Club Life Member and was elected to the Club Hall of Fame posthumously in 2006. The Ron Clack Best Clubman was awarded each year and the Clack/Murrells Trophy was struck to coincide with the 100th game between the City and Geelong Guild Clubs in the Ballarat/Geelong Association. He was also Ballarat Association President for many years during the 1960’s and 1970’s, Ballarat Umpires Association President and Treasurer.
He was made a Life Member of the Ballarat Association posthumously in around 1990 and Life Member of the Umpires Association. Ron was closely involved with Ballarat City Baseball Club and he coached numerous under-aged Ballarat teams.
Ron served a remarkable 16 consecutive years as secretary of the Victorian Provincial Baseball league between 1961 and 1976. He was inducted as Life Member of the then Victorian Provincial Baseball League in 1976 and as a Ballarat Baseball Association Hall of Famer in the early 2000s. Ron’s service to baseball was an era during which the Victorian Provincial Baseball League was a powerful baseball association that encompassed and regulated all regional leagues from across Victoria, many of which are now defunct.
Among his many duties, Ron oversaw organisation and delivery of both senior and junior championship series and the Queen’s Birthday Carnival was the pinnacle of winter player achievement.
One of Ron’s final responsibilities was overseeing delivery of the 1985 Carnival in Bendigo, an event that drew an extraordinary 13 senior and 6 junior teams as the Victorian Provincial Baseball League progressed through what can be described as ‘A Golden Era’, one that owed so much to the foresight and the determination of a handful of outstanding, largely unpaid administrators. Ron was an inaugural member of the Ballarat Sportsmen’s Club and a former president and was inducted as a life member in the category of baseball.