Memories Will Linger About Local Wild Man
By EARL MOREY
Headlight-Sun Staff Member
From The Pittsburg Headlight-Sun Newspaper, July 24, 1973.
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Red Berry is dead. But the memories will linger on.
I've been a sports writer for more than 25 years and during that time have met a goodly number of outstanding athletic
figures.
But none will compare to the friendly, rugged, sincere, likable Wild Red Berry.
The guy once tried to teach me to wrestle. He failed, probably one of the few failures of his life. I didn't have the
balance. But I did have his friendship, and that I will cherish.
Red, during his young years, worked at the Kansas City Southern shops and wrestled during his off time. He wrestled when
it was a tough business. Low pay, long hours, and tough.
Once, after finishing my stint with the Navy during World War II, I asked Red why he didn't give up the business. After
all, he had done it all. The famous, and the not-so-well known knew him and loved him.
His answer..."I fought during the long struggles, and I'll fight until I can't fight anymore. This is the first time the
real money has been there."
And fought he did.
Red's life was his family and his friends. And a great family he has. And there isn't enough paper to list his friends...
real friends, people who thought of him as I did, and many probably even more so.
To really know Red was to travel with him, to visit the attic in his Pittsburg home and to read his articles. Red was a
self-made man. He didn't finish high school, but he once astounded a convention of Nebraska doctors when he made the
featured speech, using words even some of those learned men had to check. Red studied every chance he had. And he learned.
I cherish, in my personal library that includes books autographed by Stan Musial, Ted Williams, Mickey Mantle, and many
others, the small book once written by Red about words and sentences. It's signed, after a long statement, and it's the one
I favor the most.
Remember when Red promoted the wrestling bouts with Gorgeous George. They fought throughout the Southwest, including
Pittsburg, Joplin, cities in Arkansas, Oklahoma and Texas. Red normally was the villain except when he was in Pittsburg.
He loved Pittsburg and he wasn't about to do anything that would bring it harm.
After all, Red once was the mayor of Pittsburg, if only for a day.
Red exercised every day. He didn't drink, smoke or do anything to take away from the God given health that was awarded to
him by Higher Powers. Even when he played golf, before he took his right-handed swing, he would swing the club left-handed:
Keep the balance, he would say.
Red didn't like to drive, but he had a wonderful wife who took care of that chore for him.
Red fought a tough battle these past few years. He had trouble speaking. And he was a talker.
Just a few short days ago, Red dropped by the Headlight-Sun to show me the instructions he had to follow in order to talk
and to be understood. They were tough rules, but Red was used to tough rules.
Today, he's dead.
But who can forget the time he was thrown out of the ring in Texas and broke his back? And who can forget the time in
California when Red was the villain and a woman ringsider smacked him over the head with a Coke bottle? And the time (this is
from him, since I wasn't around at the time) when he tried his hand at boxing? "A tough way to make a living," the Wild Man
said.
Wild? No, not Ralph "Red" Berry. He leaves behind this memory. He was the type of man I am damn happy to have known and to
have had for a friend, the type of man Pittsburg should be proud of. And I know Pittsburg will be.
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