Category: In Memoriam

Sad News | Oldest NMRA Member Ben Marshall passed, 09/08/13, after a brief illness. Ben was inducted into the NMRA Hall of Fame in 2011 and will be missed by all of us in the racquetball community.. A comprehensive obituary reports that he was commissioned as a 2nd Lieutenant through ROTC, entered the US Army immediately after graduation and joined the 9th Infantry Division at Ft. Bragg, North Carolina; later transferring to the US Army Air Force for pilot training. He served as a fighter pilot until his separation from the service in 1946. From 1946 until January 1951, he worked as a baker and production manager for Marshall's Electric Maid Bakeries in Mobile. Ben re-entered the service as an Infantry Captain assigned as an Assistant Professor of Military Science and Commandant of Cadets at Marion Institute. His next assignment was with the 24th Infantry Division in Korea. Throughout his Army career, Ben served in Command and Staff positions in the U.S.,...

Sad News | Gene Grapes, NMRA Charter Member Passes, 09/07/12, in Irwin, Pennsylvania. This pivotal figure in the sport's history was an early supporter of racquetball, who was later inducted into 1982 USAR Hall of Fame as an amateur athlete/contributor and into the 1996 NMRA Hall of Fame as a founding contributor. Prior to the formation of the International Racquetball Association [IRA], he helped organize and played primarily in Pennsylvania State YMCA sponsored tournaments. He was elected to the board of directors of the IRA in 1975 and served as executive vice president during his tenure on the board. He held five national doubles and national singles titles, in addition to national singles and doubles invitational titles. Gene overwhelmingly dominated his age group for nearly 10 years. The birth of the NMRA began at an IRA sponsored tournament in Salt Lake City, Utah, in 1971, where Sam Caiazza dreamed up the idea of hosting a national invitational round-robin tournament on two courts at the New Castle, Pennsylvania, YMCA....