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 Jack Lohrke and the 1951 Season Photo Gallery
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Shootings, Murders, and Near-Tragedies, Part IV:

The Amazing Story of Jack “Lucky” Lohrke!

Those of you who have been following along in this series will remember I’ve featured Billy Jurges, shot in 1932 by scorned lover Violet Popovich Valli, Eddie Waitkus, shot in1949 by stalker Ruth Ann Steinhagen, and Bugs Raymond, killed after being hit with a bat.  For Part IV, I’ve done a complete “180” and have expanded the scope to include ballplayers who escaped death after experiencing near-tragedies. I’m starting it off with the amazing story of Jack “Lucky” Lohrke. I think you’ll find it of interest.

But first, check out the caption to the featured photo: 

“You were thinking of doing what??…Haha!…Don’t make me laugh!”

I actually made this quote up for the featured photo – one of my all-time favorites – but it pretty well sums up the defensive prowess of the Hall-of-fame catcher, Roy Campanella. Judging by the grimace on the face of the Giants base runner, Jack Lohrke, I have a hunch he regretted trying to score against Campanella. I’d say Campy literally “flattened” him. He was out by the old “country mile!”

But the reason I reposted this pic was not to comment about the great Campanella. Rather, it was to turn the spotlight on the base runner, Jack “Lucky” Lohrke. This play may have been one of the few times in his life when “luck” wasn’t on his side. By the time he was 22, Lohrke was known to have escaped death on at least six separate occasions – by sheer good luck!

Here’s some of his “close shaves” with death for the Los Angeles native:

-As a member of the 35th Infantry Division, he fought in the D-Day invasion of Normandy, the Battle of the Bulge, and saw extensive combat throughout Europe. Reportedly, on four occasions solders on either side of him were killed in combat while he emerged unscathed.

-Also during World War II, he survived a troop train crash that killed three soldiers and injured dozens more,

-On his way home from the war in 1945, he was bumped at the last moment from a military transport scheduled to fly from Camp Kilmer, New Jersey to his home in Los Angeles. This was to make room for a higher ranking military “big shot.”  The plane crashed 45 minutes after takeoff, killing everyone on board.

-Traveling at dusk in a light rain on Washington’s Highway 10 en route to Bremerton, eight Spokane Indians players and their manager were killed when their team bus veered off a Cascade Mountain pass road to avoid an oncoming car. Lohrke, a passenger on the bus, had left it at its last stop, 15 minutes before the accident because he had just received orders to report to San Diego.

In a 1994 interview, Lohrke looked back on the tragic bus accident and said, “When you’re the age I was back then, you haven’t got a worry in the world. And then…well, sometimes those names spring back at me.”

Here’s a passage from Sports Illustrated, November 14, 1994, talking about how he got his nickname:

From the time he joined the Padres after the accident, Lohrke was called, for obvious reasons, “Lucky” Lohrke, the ballplayer who got off the bus in the nick of time, the soldier bumped from the plane that crashed. The name stuck. Who else, after all, had more right to be called Lucky? He’s in the Baseball Encyclopedia that way: Lucky Lohrke. 

In a rather unremarkable seven-year major league career (1947-’53), 6’0″ 180-pound third baseman Jack Lohrke played for the Giants (1947- ‘51), and the Phillies (1952- ’53), posting a .242 average with 22 home runs and 96 RBIs over 354 games. One career highlight was playing in the 1951 World Series against the Yankees. He made two plate appearances without a hit. In Game Three of the 1951 playoffs against the Dodgers, Lohrke was set to come in if it went extra innings, but Bobby Thomson’s famous “Shot Heard ‘Round the World” ended the game in the ninth.

The Giants traded Jack to the Phillies’ Whiz Kids in 1952.  He was a reserve for two years until a trade to the Pirates landed him with their minor league affiliate in the Pacific Coast League. Lohrke was also known for his incredibly strong arm. At spring training in 1950, the Giants once tried him out as a pitcher.  Although he never got into a major league game as a pitcher, he later pitched in relief when he returned to the PCL in 1954 with the Hollywood Stars. He remained in the PCL for his last five years of pro ball. 

After his baseball career ended, Lohrke worked as head of security for the Lockheed Corporation in his native California. He passed away in 2009, aged 85, shortly after suffering a stroke.

Jack Lohrke lived with the nickname Lucky,” but he never liked it, never wanted to be reminded of how close he had come to riding in that bus….or that train…or that plane. He was one lucky guy.

Gary Livacari 

Photo Credits: All from Google search

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