Bob Smedley Sr. Dies; Dedicated Bar to Baseball

Restaurateur Bob Smedley Sr., whose love for baseball was reflected by the abundance of memorabilia that decorate the walls of his Gaslamp Quarter tavern like religious icons, died Wednesday of complications arising from blood poisoning. He was 69.

He died peacefully at a local hospital after a three-week illness, said his son, Bob Smedley Jr., co-owner with his father of Smedley’s Baseball Inn.

Smedley’s Baseball Inn is a bar and restaurant that, under a couple of guises and locations, has been a San Diego fixture for 53 years. The comely waitresses and female bartenders that Smedley recruited for the bar were as much a feature of the tavern as the photographs of old ballplayers that adorn the walls.

The bar was formerly known as Carl’s Baseball Inn, after the original owner, Carl Parlapiano, who opened it at 16th and Island streets in 1935. Smedley, a San Diego native, purchased the bar in 1975 and moved it to its current location at 5th Avenue and Island Street in November, 1985. He was one of the few merchants whose business survived after it was moved to the Gaslamp.

A stout man whose rumpled appearance camouflaged a heart-warming character, Smedley could talk for hours with stranger and friend alike about baseball or issues of the day. His stooped shoulders, broad, bespectacled face and omnipresent drink in hand were familiar sights at the tavern, which has become a popular downtown meeting place for sports fans.

Smedley was a teammate of Ted Williams at Hoover High School, where he graduated in 1936. Numerous photos of the Splendid Splinter, including a picture of Williams signing his first professional contract with the old Pacific Coast League San Diego Padres, line the bar’s walls. Also on display in the bar are an oversized pair of Satchel Paige’s spikes and Rogers Hornsby’s glove, which Smedley “acquired” a few years ago.

Admired Williams

“I tell everybody that I taught Ted everything that he knows about baseball,” Smedley used to joke. “ . . . He used those tips to go on to the Hall of Fame, while I never got out of the sandlots.”

He admired Williams, but Smedley often said that his favorite major league ballplayer was Bob Elliott. Elliott, a much-traveled infielder/outfielder from the 1940s and 1950s, was also the subject of Smedley’s favorite baseball story.

“Bob upheld a ballplayer’s highest traditions, both on and off the field,” Smedley used to say with a gleam in his eye.

One day Elliott made a couple of bad plays at third base and was being ridiculed unmercifully by a spectator, Smedley said. The young man, noting Elliott’s age, yelled that he was old enough to be his father and, therefore, too old to be playing ball.

According to Smedley, Elliott responded: “Young man, I came through here 20 years ago. You’re right. I could very well be your father.”

Funeral services are scheduled Sunday at Goodbody Mortuary in El Cajon. Visitation will be from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. Burial will be in Ft. Rosecrans National Cemetery.

In addition to Bob Smedley Jr., survivors include his father, Lon B. Smedley, 96, three brothers and two sisters.