The "Eating My Way Through Baseball" Story

It was an ordinary day.  Looking at a small piece of green tablet paper my wife handed me with "Eating My Way Thru Baseball" written on the top and the name Barry Weinberg written on the bottom.  She said I would probably enjoy reading the book while on vacation.  The note sat on my desk a few weeks until yesterday when I "Googled" "Eating My Way Thru Baseball" and found the story of Barry Weinberg's love of our Nation's favorite pastime.

Barry Weinberg

As I read more about Barry and his book I found he also wrote a blog.  Within seconds I had his blog on my MacIntosh desktop computer and spent the next hour or so exploring his blog which is titled "Barry Weinberg's 'Eating My Way Through Baseball', Life's a journey, enjoy the meal!"  As I read more I realized that Barry grew up in Silver Spring, Maryland which is a short ride from where my daughter Brynn and her family live in Urbana, Maryland  (Yes...I even thought about a visit with Barry at sometime in the future).  He writes in his blog that his life was changed when Frank Howard (Washington Senators baseball team All-Star) moved in across the street from him.  Frank used to play wiffle ball with the neighborhood kids in the street and used to take him to the ballpark to watch batting practice.  Barry graduated from Springfield College where he played baseball for four years.  He then went to Indiana University to do graduate work.  He claims to have had good grades in only two classes; Care and Prevention of Athletic Injuries and First Aid.  Made his life's work easy to predict.  Before long he was working for the Pittsburg Pirates organization as a trainer.  To this day he still has no idea how he got the job, since he had no experience, didn't have a degree in athletic training, wasn't certified and hadn't finished his education.  In another part of this blog I found a story of how he now lives his life.  His love of baseball began nearly 60 years ago.  

Barry helping the St. Louis catcher off the field.

He has spent over 40 years working in professional baseball as an Athletic Trainer from the minor leagues to the World Series.  Worked with the Pirates, New York Yankees, Oakland A's and the St. Louis Cardinals.  He writes that "It is unbelievable to me what a young boy from Silver Spring, Maryland; Edith and Harold's only son; has had the opportunity to do."  He also writes, "I've met and befriended wonderful personalities, a lot of whom are mega stars, and witnessed the funniest things (before games were televised) and heard the craziest stories everywhere from the dugout to the locker-room and dined all over the country and in many parts of the world."  

Neil Armstrong

Today he is known best as "Uncle Barry", since his college best friend Ed Folli's kids started to call him that.  Then Ed's son Michael was drafted by the Cardinals and he continued to call Barry "Uncle Barry" so it stuck with everyone.  He tells that he can't cook, but loves to eat out.  I'm sure he has frequented many restaurants during his years of working in professional baseball.  Actually the first sentence in his book says: "I can't cook - nor do I try."  He now shares little tastes on his Blog in no particular order to wet your appetite.  I must admit I loved his stories and the photographs he shared with everyone on his blog.  I loved the story of his meeting and eating with Neil Alden Armstrong who was an American astronaut, engineer and the first person to walk on the Moon.   You too can view his blog at: https://www.eatingmywaythroughbaseball.com/blog-1. It was another extraordinary day in the life of an ordinary guy.

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