The Thief of the Southern League’s exploits on the field, with the bat and on the base paths will be honoured this Saturday at North Battleford by the Saskatchewan Baseball Hall of Fame.
Bev Hickie has been selected to enter the Hall as a player in its 32nd annual induction ceremony. Hickie is being acknowledged for his contributions to the game starting with his early love of baseball as a child on his family’s farm near Killaly that prepared him for the many years he spent tearing up the base paths for his hometown Athletics and Melville Millionaires and finally helped him participate in and grow the game in the community of Estevan.
“I guess it feels pretty good,” said Hickie about receiving the honour. “All the years that I played ball and all that, some people felt I should have been inducted into the Baseball Hall of Fame, but I never thought anything of it. Then I started looking at some people who were in there and I played ball with them, so it feels pretty good.”
Hickie said he was first introduced to baseball by his teacher Andy Joresson while attending Gelowitz School in the district of Assiniboia during the 1950’s. He said the kids at the rural one-room grades one through eight school used to play ball from the moment a spot of grass appeared out of the snow in the spring until the winter took the fields back over.
This early dedication to the game helped Hickie earn a spot on the Gary League’s Killaly Athletics senior team while still completing his Grade 9 studies. Hickie’s proficiency in the batter’s box, speed on the base paths and talent in the field where he switched between every position except shortstop based on the team’s needs helped him earn an all-star selection during one season with the Athletics.
Then as a Grade 12 athlete, Hickie began playing with the Melville Millionaires of the South Saskatchewan Baseball League (Southern League) in the early 1960’s. He said the competition he faced with the Athletics was tough, but the play he encountered in the Southern League was fierce thanks to the league’s import rule that allowed star players from the U.S. including Terry Buck, who is also being inducted into the Hall this year, and legendary Negro Baseball League catcher Ira McKnight a chance to play.
“It was quite an honour,” said Hickie. “I played with them and my biggest thing was to try and beat them. The year I won the batting (title), I beat Ira McNight by a couple of points in the last game. It was challenging and rewarding.”
In addition to excelling at the plate, Hickie also earned a Southern League’s most runs scored crown one season as well as the most stolen bases award, hence the Thief of the Southern League nickname. After about a decade playing with the Millionaries, Hickie settled down to a quieter life in Estevan during the early 1970’s with his growing family and employment as a teacher at Immaculate Heart Junior High School before moving on to work as the principal at St. John’s School and then St. Mary’s School.
However, Hickie’s involvement with the game didn’t stop after the Southern League as he continued playing baseball with the senior teams in Estevan and Torquay as well as fastball with the Colonels. The Baseball Hall of Fame inductee’s time in the game also went a further quarter of a century as both a player and a manager with the Estevan Twilite baseball team.
“Just enjoy the day, that’s all,” said Hickie, about what he’ll do to celebrate his induction into the Hall this Saturday. “Bob Burns, he’s on the executive and he said there are a lot of things to see in the museum to take an interest in. Just go check everything out, that’s what I’ll do.”
