William Gallagher retired from the city of Santa Rosa in 2003 as the parking programs coordinator. He was USF baseball’s 1962 leading hitter and later went on to have a career playing senior softball until 2011.
Bill Gallagher, Senior athlete — Drake High School
It’s not unheard of to finish a slow pitch softball career with a home run.
To do it at age 74, now that’s remarkable.
Such was the storybook ending to former Sir Francis Drake High basketball and baseball standout Bill Gallagher’s athletic career, one that surely had a storybook beginning and middle as well.
Gallagher, a 6-foot-5, 205-pound powerhouse, was Paul Silas and Bill Cartwright at the prestigious basketball Tournament of Champions before those two NBA stars dominated there.
He had a then-record 21 rebounds in one TOC game as a junior in 1957, then led all scorers — including Encinal High standout Tommy Harper — with a total of 55 points in three games the following season.
“That was highlight of my career,” Gallagher said of his TOC appearances. “My junior year, we had Ronnie Cox. He led the tournament in scoring. Then the next year, I did it.”
It was good enough to get him a scholarship to USF, where Gallagher and his teammates had the honor of opening Memorial Gym in 1958.
But truth be told, Gallagher might have been better in baseball. By the end of his USF athletic career, he was focused on baseball, where he led the team with a .379 average one year.
The best was yet to come.
Gallagher went on to become of of the most successful slow pitch softball players in the country, earning two all-tournament awards at the World Championships and hitting .917 one year at the World Masters.
Before his grand finale as a member of the Sonoma Fog in 2014, his biggest single hit had been a game-winning, two-run home run in the bottom of the seventh inning in the 2011 Western Nationals championship game in Mesquite, Nevada.
“I had just bought a new bat,” he recalled. “I hit one so far over the right fielder’s head … I rounded third base and they told me to slow down. I don’t slow down until I crossed the plate.”
Asked if he also remembered the career-ending homer, he observed, “By that point, I was like 6-5, 230. I could still hit homers. The rare thing about that one was that it was an inside-the-park home run.”
Today, the Rincon Valley resident, who retired from his job working for the City of Santa Rosa in 2003, and his wife of 55 years remain big sports fans.
“I saw Barry Bonds hit quite a few homers out of Pac Bell (Park),” the fellow lefty slugger noted (MarinIndJournal).
