Legendary feats

Saturday at the Carson Community Center, right off the 405 Freeway in Carson:
The daughters of two prominent figures in Pacific Coast League history will be featured at the 21st annual Pacific Coast League Historical Society reunion.
Adrienne Ashford, daughter of Emmett Ashford, the first black umpire in the PCL and in the major leagues, will speak on her father’s career. Emmett Ashford umpired in the PCL in the 1950s and in the American League from 1966 to 1970. He died in 1980 at 65. Adrienne Ashford has written a book, “Strrr-ike!! Emmett Ashford, Major League Umpire,� about her father.
Then, Barbara Schuster-Kettle, daughter of shortstop Bill Schuster, will receive a plaque honoring her father as a 2006 inductee to the Pacific Coast League Hall of Fame. Schuster was with the Seattle Rainers in 1940 and 1941 and again in 1949 and 1950; the Los Angeles Angels in 1941 to 1943 and 1946 to 1949; and with the Hollywood Stars in 1952. He had a lifetime batting average of .275 in 1,450 PCL games. He hit .234 in five seasons in the National League. He died in 1987 at 74.
The other PCL Hall of Fame inductees this year include Dom DiMaggio, 89, an outfielder with the San Francisco Seals froom 1937 through 1939, and Eddie Basinski, 82, a second baseman with the Portland Beavers from 1947 through 1957 and with Seattle later in 1957.
The event starts at 9 a.m., lunch is at noon, and the program runs from 1:30 to 3:30 p.m. Admission is free. For more information: PCLHS founder Richard Beverage (714) 935-9993 or Jay Berman (310) 374-5186.

Then, on Sunday, July 23 at the Pasadena Central Library:
Baseball Reliquary, a Southern California-based nonprofit organization dedicated to fostering an appreciation of American art and culture through the context of baseball history, will honor its class of 2006 to the Shrine of the Eternals, which is the national organization’s equivalent to the Baseball Hall of Fame.
Josh Gibson, Fernando Valenzuela and Kenichi Zenimura received the highest number of votes in balloting conducted in the month of April by the membership of the Baseball Reliquary and will join 21 other baseball luminaries who have been inducted into the Shrine since elections began in 1999, including, in alphabetical order, Jim Abbott, Dick Allen, Moe Berg, Ila Borders, Jim Bouton, Roberto Clemente, Rod Dedeaux, Dock Ellis, Mark Fidrych, Curt Flood, William “Dummy� Hoy, Shoeless Joe Jackson, Bill “Spaceman� Lee, Marvin Miller, Minnie Minoso, Satchel Paige, Jimmy Piersall, Pam Postema, Jackie Robinson, Lester Rodney, and Bill Veeck, Jr.
Gibson (1911-1947) is known as the Negro League's Babe Ruth, Valenzuela, of course, the former Dodgers star left-hander. And Zenimure (1900 to 1968) is known as the father of Japanese-American baseball.
For additional information on the Shrine of the Eternals, visit the Baseball Reliquary Web site at www.baseballreliquary.org, or contact executive director Terry Cannon at (626) 791-7647 or at terymar@earthlink.net.