Turk Lown obit

A love for family, baseball and poultry

 He was not on the list.

He was not a native son, but Turk Lown was Pueblo's most famous Major League Baseball player. Lown died Friday of leukemia at the age of 92 in Pueblo, Colorado. While Omar was his given name, everybody simply called him Turk. It was a nickname he obtained for his love of feasting on turkey. "Some of his family called him Omar way back when he was young. Turk was the name that he was known," said his son Gary on Tuesday. Lown called Pueblo home since 1947 when he played for the Pueblo Dodgers and met Puebloan Violet Krizman. "She became my best friend for life," he always would say of his wife of 67 years. Violet Lown, four grown children -- sons Craig, Gary, Terry and daughter Tracy -- five grandchildren and five great-grandchildren survive him. A funeral Mass is scheduled at 10 a.m. Friday at St. Mary Church, 217 E. Mesa Ave. "He lived an active life and a good one, too," Gary Lown said of his father. "He played golf well into his late-80s and driving a car at 91. He was doing everything pretty well." Born on Memorial Day in Brooklyn, N.Y., Lown pitched in the major leagues for 11 seasons, compiling a 55-61 record for three teams: Chicago Cubs (1951-58), Cincinnati (1958) and Chicago White Sox (1958-62). It was with the White Sox that Lown made his mark as a hard-throwing relief pitcher. In 1959, he helped the White Sox reach the World Series, where he did not surrender a run in three appearances against the Los Angeles Dodgers. The Dodgers won the series in six games. Lown actually was signed to a professional contract by the then-Brooklyn Dodgers. He began his pro career in 1942 with the Dodgers' farm team in Valdosta, Ga. It didn't last long. Lown's career, as well as other professional players, was interrupted by World War II. He served three years in the Army and fought in the Battle of the Bulge, where he suffered shrapnel wounds in his leg. He was awarded the Purple Heart. Upon his military discharge, Lown returned to the diamond in 1946. A year later, he wound up in Pueblo with the Dodgers' Class A club in the Western League. He won 30 games in two seasons. Lown eventually reached the big leagues when the Chicago Cubs obtained him in 1951. The Cubs moved him to the bullpen in 1955, which spurred his career. Lown landed with the White Sox in 1958. Initially, the Cubs traded him to Cincinnati and the Reds sent him back to Chicago, but with the Sox. A year later, Lown was a major player in the White Sox's magical 1959 season. Chicago won the American League pennant for the first time in 40 years, but lost to the Dodgers in six games. The attendance of 92,706 for Game Five, which the White Sox won 1-0, remains a World Series single-game record. Lown, who led the American League in saves with 15, was selected to the MLB's All-Star Game that season. Lown retired in 1962 at age 38 and returned to Pueblo with his young family. He worked as a mail carrier for the U.S. Postal Service for 23 years. "For us, it wasn't any different?.?.?.?very normal," Gary Lown said about growing up with a major league player. "We were really young when he played baseball, I was about 10 when he finished up. The only thing a little different is that we'd leave school a little early and spend time in Chicago (during the season), then come back to go to school. It was more just a family. He really wanted it that way." All three boys wound up being pitchers as well, but it "really was a coincidence," said Gary Lown, who is the head baseball coach at South High School. "When you're young, everybody wants to be a pitcher. I think we just got my dad's genes, we threw the ball really good. We went to the park to play baseball and just ended up pitching." His dad gave the boys some help with their pitching, Gary Lown said. "In college I needed a change-up and he taught me that. But, he just wanted it to be fun for us. He wanted us to enjoy it. He was our biggest supporter as a father." The Lown boys, naturally, dreamed of following in their father's footsteps to the major leagues. "That's every kid's dream," Gary Lown said. "Having a father there, of course, we wanted to be a major league pitcher at one time. Craig was fortunate to be drafted (White Sox, first round, 1971) and played a little minor league. We all had fun in high school and Craig and I got to play some in college." Turk Lown's final big league numbers read: 55-61 win-loss record, 4.12 earned run average, 574 strikeouts and 73 saves in 543 appearances on the mound. He would say years later that pitching in the World Series was one of the highlights of his career. "It was Fabulous. It was what you play and work for your whole life -- and so many players never got the chance," he said in a 2003 Chieftain interview. llopez@chieftain.com