The Pecan Park Eagle

Solly Hemus Died Today
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October 3, 2017

Tuesday, October 3, 2017, Houston, Texas, 3:21 PM. The following e-mail from Lynda J. Carnegie arrived in behalf of Solly and Betty Hemus:

“I just wanted to let you know that Solly Hemus passed away this morning. He passed very peacefully and was not in any pain.  Funeral arrangements are pending. Obituary will be in the Chronicle in the next few days.”

Solly Hemus was 94 years old when he died. As always, he had been quietly, but fiercely fighting off ill-health in recent years and, irony of ironies, he would have been the last person we could imagine  ever choosing to leave now – just two days shy of the MLB Playoffs first game in Houston – now set to go at Minute Maid Park at 3:00 PM on Thursday, October 5th. The former Houston Buff, St. Louis Cardinal, and Philadelphia Phillie would have been there at MMP with his beloved wife, Betty, for the whole ride, we think, but, as always, death comes when it’s time, and not in accord to how we humanly try to rate the inconvenience of the moment it actually chooses.

Even though we were not close social friends, contact wise, I shall always love Solly Hemus til the end of my own human time – and, hopefully, beyond. He was my first hero when I discovered baseball in 1947 with the Houston Buffs – and I remained one of his loyal supporters through his career with the Cardinals and Phillies, and later, as manager of the Cardinals. It was only much later that I discovered through the echoes of others about Solly’s generosity to all sorts of social programs of support in the Houston community. And that these charities often shared only one thing in common. – That one thing was Solly’s insistence upon the anonymous character he chose to enclose around each gift. For example, Solly Hemus was the anonymous principal underwriter of our Larry Dierker Chapter SABR book, “Houston Baseball, The Early Years, 1861-1961.”

Now that Solly’s work is done here, we think it’s more than OK to shine the light on his unselfish generosity – and his unselfish heart.

Rest in Peace, Solly Hemus. – You will be missed. – And some of us will have to hold onto the faith that your spirit is still hovering near your regular seats behind the Astros dugout on Thursday – because it’s definitely going to feel like you should still be there. – Another 48 hours aren’t enough time to loosen our grip on that idea – and maybe it never will change. Maybe it will just hang with us through eternity – that the Spirit of Solly Hemus is – the Houston Strong Spirit forever!

Here’s a link to another column I wrote on Solly Hemus a few years ago:

Solly Hemus: “Little Pepper Pot” of the ’47 Buffs.

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Tags: RIP: Solly Hemus Died Today

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