The Catch of a Lifetime at an Arizona Ballpark

When George Monforte was a little kid growing up in New York City, his mother said he was so crazy about baseball that he’d probably get married at home plate.

Well, 30 years later, Monforte, an investment counselor in Camarillo, decided his mother’s joke wasn’t such a bad idea. So he got married last Saturday at home plate in Diablo Stadium in Tempe, Ariz., to Barbara Praino, 32, of Malibu.

Monforte, 37, who was signed by the Dodgers out of high school but was injured before he could begin a major league career, just happened to be in Tempe, participating in Baseball Fantasies Fulfilled, a weeklong baseball clinic and camp for business and professional men. They got to play baseball with former major leaguers Mickey Mantle, John Roseboro, Maury Wills, Moose Skowron, Juan Marichal and Brooks Robinson. Eighty men attended the camp, which costs $2,995 for the week.

For the ceremony, Monforte’s teammates--he played on the Yankee squad--formed a double line of crossed bats for the bride and bridegroom to walk through toward home plate. And Huey Lewis and the News, who were in Tempe to play in a celebrity game following the wedding, sang “So in Love” for the happy couple.

Praino, not a baseball fanatic like her new husband, was a good sport about having a baseball wedding, Monforte said. “She likes baseball,” he said. “But she’s really a Ping-Pong nut. She went out and bought a Ping-Pong table so she could beat me.”

Valentine for Harts

When Valentine’s Day comes around next week, it will be George and Bea Hart’s special day in Long Beach.

The Long Beach Youth Home Boosters will hold their first “gala,” honoring the Harts. And that’s only fair, since the Harts have spent a lot of energy the past 15 years making life better for the teen-agers at the Youth Home.

A partner in a Los Angeles law firm, Hart became involved when Trailback, as it was then known, opened near Wilson High School in 1970. There were what Hart calls “pretty serious cases . . . rough kids . . . Nobody ever wants one of these things in their neighborhood,” he said.

But he became involved, got his wife involved, and what the Harts will look back on next week is a commitment that has changed the lives of hundreds of boys.

The make-up of the home today, Hart explained, is determined by the Los Angeles Probation Department. Many boys, he said, are there because they have nowhere else to go.

His wife, Bea, joined the board earlier on, Hart said, and got friends of hers into fund-raising activities. What funds the county provides is “mere warehousing.” Year by year, Hart said, the home is “getting better and better. These are just children who have had no love. The big point I make in fund-raising is that we handle about 40 boys, from 12 to 16 . . . and our records show that about 60% of all the boys get out of high school, get into the service, or get jobs . . . a 60% success rate.”

“There is no such thing as a bad kid. It’s just bad parents.” Hart said. “These are kids who have no love and affection and no place to go home to.”

And, said Hart, “saving 60% is quite a contribution to the community.”

The gala--naturally a fund-raiser for the Youth Home--will be held aboard the Queen Mary on Thursday.

“It’s not a head table-plaque party,” Hart said. “We’re just going to have a Valentine’s party and we’re going to have Les Brown’s orchestra.”

IMAX Film Festival

And speaking of bands: Everybody is getting onto the high-tech bandwagon these days, including the California Museum of Science and Industry. Not only does it have a new space museum and loads of new high-tech exhibits, but it has IMAX Theater, which, through a special sound and film technique, produces the world’s largest film format on a gigantic screen, five stories high, 70-feet wide.

IMAX, which stands for Image Maximization, has a new sponsor, Mitsubishi Electric, America, which just announced a five-year funding program. Renamed the Mitsubishi IMAX, the theater premieres its first film festival starting today and running though Feb. 24. Nine films are scheduled for viewing.

“This museum is one of the boldest and most daring museums I have encountered,” said Mitsubishi director of marketing and sales Laszlo Kovacs. “Its high-tech, quality-oriented exhibits parallel with our own activities into a number of high-tech programs. It’s just so logical for us to be a part of it.”

Persons interested in seeing the IMAX festival can get an all-day pass that entitles them to see all nine films for $15. It’s $4 for one show, $6 for two and $9 for three. Children and senior prices are $2, $4 and $6. And there is a special family rate that enables a family of four to see a film for $12, or $8 with a discount coupon, available at the museum.

Nothing Ventured . . .

How do you start a business if you’re a teen-ager? Easy, says Daniel Hostettler, who just turned 17 and is president of Bits and Bytes Computers in Woodland Hills.

First, you convince your parents that you’re serious about starting a computer company with your brother and two friends. Then you get your parents and one of the friends’ dads to loan you $450 apiece for start-up costs, and another to donate office space.

“You start out selling small stuff,” said Hostettler, “like I Love Computers T-shirts, mugs, memo pads, personalized, computerized Christmas cards, and try to make a name for yourselves.”

Hostettler, his brother, Marcus, 14, Todd Chodorow, 17, and Lee Ladisky, 16, also will tutor people in computer science and will design software. They sell computers, too, on an order-only basis, because they don’t have the money to keep a large inventory.

“We’re working on paying back our parents,” said Hostettler, explaining that the foursome opened the company in September. “And some people have been willing to help us, giving us discounts on printing flyers, things like that. I figure if we don’t make any money, it will have been a heck of a learning experience. You wouldn’t believe all the stuff you have to go through to get a business license, set up a partnership agreement, all sorts of things.”

The kids operate Bits and Bytes themselves, using an answering service to take calls during the day when they’re in school. They work in the office on weekends.