By Steve Bradley
The Charlie Weeden Tournament and Softball Field Dedication Day was a huge success. Plenty of hard work and preparation that, along with the first beautiful day of the year, made for a day to remember. A great crowd showed up, four Wasaren League teams came to play to win, making for plenty of excitement on the field. This all combined for an event that could not have been better.
Hoosic Valley, Greenwich, Cambridge and host Hoosick Falls softball teams provided the on-field entertainment. Games began around 10 am and continued until about 7 pm. A corn hole tournament was held by the football bleachers.
Kevin Weeden, Charlie’s nephew, began the dedication by taking to the infield with Charlie’s family and many of the people who made the day possible. Kevin thanked everyone and introduced all the people. Jim Weeden, Charlie’s son, thanked everyone for coming and spoke of how humbled his Dad would be to see all the people, teams and dugouts with his name on them. Eamonn DeGraaf, primary builder of the new dugouts, was introduced. Ken Facin, Superintendent of HFCS, spoke of how much Charlie had done for the area and how much he touched the people who crossed his path through the many years in and out of the school where Charlie was employed as the transportation supervisor.
Charlie’s wife, Sharon (McDonough) was introduced and threw out the ceremonial first pitch. The covers on the new dugout signs were dropped and the Charlie Weeden Softball Field was christened.
Softball games were resumed and the second corn hole round began. With the spectacular weather, people stayed for much of the day. Ice cream was given away, raffles were held, hot dogs were eaten and folks mingled.
Later in the day, everyone was hoping they were going to be the winner of the 50/50 raffle. Around 4 pm it was in the neighborhood of $2,500 and climbing. When the drawing was made, Andrea Weeden, Charlie’s daughter who lives in Florida, was the winner of $2,900.
The entire day was a wonderful tribute to a man who had such a good sense of humor, touched so many people and left memories for his family, friends and players they will never forget. He wanted his teams to win but he wanted them to have fun doing it. Pretty much how he lived his life.