In baseball Chico continues to be the most inspirational man of his time in Venezuela and should never be forgotten

Last month the Pope visited the United States and I watched every day of his 6 day visit to America. It made me reflect that I am a Catholic and through my life when I disagreed with some of the dogmas of the Catholic Church I thought that in my lifetime I could never change my religion or ever be anything else but Catholic.

In a way similar to my faith in Catholicism when I first came to Venezuela in 1962 I taught sports in the of Catia. This was when I first fell in love with the people of Venezuela and especially the children and the families of the barrios.

When invited to their homes in Catia they gave me their food when they had no food to spare. They gave me their bed when I was happy to sleep in a hammock and they looked out for me to make sure I was safe.

These beautiful memories and my love for the people of Venezuela has remained in my heart for all of my life.
From 1951 to 1954 I attended a Catholic high school in Chicago 3 blocks from Comiskey Park and saw Chico Carrasquel play. What he did as a young man was amazing and he quickly became my idol.

• In 1999 I was privileged to meet and become good friends with my favorite baseball player of all time, Chico Carrasquel.

In all of the articles that have been written about Chico there was something for which he received little or no credit and that was the inspiration he gave to other young men who wanted to play baseball.

This was a young man from the barrio of Caracas called Sarria who knew he could play baseball and despite the poverty that existed in his family he overcame every obstacle to become a major league baseball player and gave inspiration to hundreds if not thousands of young Venezuelan boys who also aspired to play professional baseball.

If you think about it without Chico's inspiration there might never have been future Venezuelan baseball stars like Luis Aparicio, Andres Gallaraga, Dave Concepcion, Omar Visquez, Bobby Abreau and so many more who gave credit to Chico for the inspiration he gave to them.

In baseball Chico continues to be the most inspirational man of his time in Venezuela and should never be forgotten and this is the reason that this foundation was established and it is our hope that in addition to the baseball park in Puerto La Cruz all Venezuelans should continue to honor him by helping us to establish baseball parks and other good works throughout the barrios of Venezuela in his name.

Joe Carroll Jaycox
Chicocarrasquel@aol.com
Co-founder, La Fundacion Chico Carrasquel
http://www.chicocarrasquel.org