My beloved Bridgeville High School Class of 1949 has lost another distinguished alumnus. This time it is Joe Stalma, an honored high school athlete and a legendary high school basketball coach in Ohio. Joe grew up on Fryer’s Hill; when I reported his passing to my friends at Brunch last week, Tom Grossi remembered the Stalmas’ living on the corner of Ella Street and Ridge Road. I remember Joe and Ernie Skvartz walking to high school, probably down Ridge to McLaughlin Run Road, then up the steps to Gregg Avenue in Greenwood Place. Joe was the tallest boy in our class (6’-4”) and tied with Leo Maruzewski for heaviest at 190 pounds. Kids were smaller then.
In those days it was customary for high school yearbooks to list each Senior’s extra-curricular activities under his/her photograph. Someone on our Yearbook staff was concerned about embarrassing those of us who weren’t “active”, so we decided to write (even more embarrassing!) four line poems instead. Under Joe’s photo was the following:
“In basketball, football, and soccer, alike
Big Joe has proved himself a star,
His hard-working nature earns him many praises,
In whatever he does, he’ll go far.”
I will be the first to concede that our class lacked a poet to challenge Longfellow. Joe was indeed a star athlete. His Senior year he was one of the mainstays of our Class B WPIAL championship team at tackle on the football team, and was honored by being selected to the WPIAL Class B All-Star team, along with end Al Bigi. He was also a major contributor to our highly competitive basketball team. Russ Kovach remarked on Joe’s deadly one-handed push shot from the corner near the side lines. Lou Kwasniewski remembered Joe playing fullback (today the position is called “defender”) on the soccer team.
I am surprised that Joe didn’t also play baseball for the high school team. I remember a pick-up sandlot game when we were Juniors in high school, played where Chartiers Valley Shopping Center now exists. Our version of the Hilltop Hellcats was challenged by a team from “Mudville”. I don’t recall who the boys were on the Mudville team, but that they had imported several “ringers” – a fast ball pitcher from Crafton and slugger Joe Stalma. We lacked an effective pitcher and soon fell far behind. Late in the game our hurler lobbed a pitch into Joe, resulting in the longest home run I ever witnessed first-hand. There was no fence in the outfield, just a billboard alongside the Washington Pike. We never did find the ball.
As a reward for his impressive career as a high school gridder, Joe earned a football scholarship from Duquesne University. Our coach, Bob Hast, had played two seasons at Duquesne before the war and was a close friend of the current coach, Phil Ahwesh. Thanks to that relationship Joe, Ray Fagan, and Bob “Huck” O’Neil all were awarded scholarships for the Dukes. They had a successful first year on the Freshmen team (Freshmen could not play varsity sports in that era), and were promoted to the varsity the next year. After a mediocre season (1951), Duquesne abruptly decided to drop football as a varsity sport. At this point Joe transferred to the University of Toledo (UT). O’Neil transferred to Notre Dame; Fagan elected to complete his education at Duquesne, as the university honored his scholarship. By this time Joe had grown an inch, bulked up to 235 pounds, and switched to end (playing both offense and defense, as everyone did in those days). He was a major contributor to the Rockets’ program for two years before graduating.
While at UT Joe hung out at the Orchard Drug store on the campus, where he met and wooed Marilyn Jones; they were married on August 2, 1952, a marriage that lasted until Joe’s death. They had four children – three daughters and Joe, Jr. According to Joe’s obituary in the Toledo Blade, he went into the service following graduation and earned a commission as a first lieutenant in the 7th Infantry Division. Following his service, he started a new career as a teacher and assistant basketball coach at Dundee, Michigan in 1958. Three years later he was teaching school at Rossford High School, near Toledo, Ohio, and serving as assistant coach for the boys’ basketball team, where he was named head coach. He also found time to earn a Master’s degree in School Administration at UT. His success at Rossford, as a teacher and as a coach, was truly impressive. Between 1966 and 1984, his teams dominated northwestern Ohio, compiling 288 wins while losing 103 games. They won nine Northern Lakes League titles, twelve sectional titles, two regional titles, and had a state runner-up finish in 1970, despite being the smallest school in Ohio’s highest classification. At one point, they won forty seven straight home games in a row in their home court, a venue that later was renamed in Joe’s honor. I was particularly interested to read that Joe donated his basketball memorabilia, including all of his game day score books, to the Rossford Public Library where they were digitized and archived as a collection.
The Stalma physical genes surfaced in Joe, Jr., who at 6’-7” tall starred for one of his father’s most successful teams, and in his grandson, Reid Fragel, 6’-8” tall and weighing 308 pounds, who starred for Ohio State’s 2012 football team at right tackle and then had a brief NFL career. I hope that the genes that gave him memorable qualities as a human being and the well-deserved sobriquet of “Gentle Giant” – unmatched kindness, sensitivity to the needs of young people he mentored, and devotion to friends and family – have also surfaced in his children and grand-children. His legacy is a credit to our community and to the Class of ’49.