Former Marietta baseball player Tom Beckwith gets overdue honor
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MARIETTA -- When spring sports were canceled last March due to the COVID-19 pandemic, former Marietta baseball coach Jim Thrash had some time on his hands.
He decided to use that time to compile some Tiger baseball history, when he stumbled upon something that caught his eye.
Marietta High School features an All-Ohio wall outside of Sutton Gymnasium which features plaques of all the former Tigers who have been honored as all-staters. However, a former baseball player by the name of Tom Beckwith slipped through the cracks.
Beckwith, a 1963 graduate of MHS, played in the All-Ohio Series his senior year. Those days, there was no official All-Ohio team, so playing in the All-Ohio Series was the only way to receive all-state honors. For whatever reason, he never got his plaque on the All-Ohio wall.
That changed Wednesday morning.
Thrash contacted Beckwith and rounded up a group of former Tiger coaches and players for a small ceremony, where Beckwith finally got to observe his plaque be placed on the wall.
"This means a lot to me," said Beckwith. "When I walked into the gym when I was a freshman in high school and I seen the pictures of these athletes, I saw mostly football, basketball, a few track stars, but there was no baseball. Baseball was my game. I loved it. I said 'One of these days I want to be hanging up there.' To me that's a great honor."
Beckwith played for legendary Tiger baseball coach Jim Jordan, an MHS Athletic Hall of Fame honoree. Jordan, describing Beckwith as a player, was quoted as saying "He's always done what I asked of him and you'll always find him hustling. He's a good all-around ballplayer who does everything well. He's given us a lot of effort in the clutch."
From 1961-1963, Beckwith and the Tigers went 41-15 and were runners-up in the COL twice and the Southeast District three times. He pitched and played center field.
As a junior and senior, he was the team leader in hits and run. His junior year, he collected 27 hits in 70 at-bats (.386 average) with one home run, 22 runs-batted-in and five triples, likely a single-season school record.
He followed that up by going 23 for 57 (.403) as a senior with one home run, 14 RBIs, four doubles and two triples. On the mound, he finished his career with an 11-3 record and 71 strikeouts in 80 innings.
"I was lucky enough my senior year to be selected to participate in the All-Ohio game,' Beckwith recalled. "I just happened to have two great years back-to-back, junior and senior year. I was voted to go play in the all-star game."
Beckwith played in the three-game series at Jets Stadium in Columbus, home of the minor league Columbus Jets (who later became the Columbus Clippers).
Beckwith is the first player in Tiger history to be selected to play in the series. After high school, he considered college baseball but opted to join the workforce instead. He briefly worked at his parents' restaurant until they sold it. He then went to work for Union Carbide until his retirement. He resides in Vienna.
"Jim called me and said 'Hey, we'd like to hang a picture of you,'" Beckwith said. "I thought that would be great. What would've made it even better is if my mom and dad could've been here."
Beckwith recalled his mom driving the entire team to games around the Mid-Ohio Valley, as they didn't have a team bus.
"She made sure we got there," he said.
"I'm really honored to be hanging here with my buddies."
Contact Jordan Holland at jholland@newsandsentinel.com.