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Obituary

A man of quiet influence

William Hernandez rubbed elbows with big names, but never said so.

By MARTY CLEAR
Published September 1, 2006

WEST TAMPA - William Hernandez was a modest man, and the hundreds of Tampa youngsters whose lives he touched never knew his name.

But for a quarter-century, Mr. Hernandez was a major force in Tampa's youth sports leagues. He died of natural causes on Aug. 26, after several years of declining health. He was 83.

From the early 1960s to the 1980s, he and his brother-in-law owned Florida Sporting Goods in downtown Tampa. The store was on Tampa Street, which became TECO Plaza, and later on Tyler Street.

In the days before sporting goods chains, Mr. Hernandez's store was a hub for the local amateur athletics community. Mr. Hernandez, known as Rudy to many of his friends, didn't talk about it much, but he knew most of Tampa's baseball greats personally.

"I remember he came over one day to throw a baseball back and forth with me, and when I looked, I saw the ball was autographed by Doc Gooden," said his granddaughter, Jessica Schultz. "He never even said anything about it. It was just a ball to him."

He loved baseball and was an ardent supporter of Little League.

"He basically supplied all the equipment and uniforms for most of the Little Leagues in Tampa," Schultz said. "He extended credit to the kids who played ball. A lot of the leagues owed him money, but he'd never try to collect because he knew that it was the kids who would suffer the most."

Mr. Hernandez would often bring home damaged baseball gloves and spend his evenings repairing them so he could donate them to a local Little League team.

He was born and raised in Ybor City, and as young man played for the Tampa Bears, a semiprofessional baseball team. He fought in the Pacific during World War II, flying 15 missions as a bombardier, but never touted his wartime record, even to his family.

After the war, he and his wife, Thelma, moved to a new home in West Tampa, where they lived for nearly 60 years. In the early 1960s, he and his brother-in-law Gene Brito opened the sporting goods store.

Mr. Hernandez attended baseball games at every level, from Little League to the minors to the Devil Rays.

"He'd sit in the stands yelling, 'Why didn't they try to bunt?' " his granddaughter said. "My uncle would have to calm him down."

He was the patriarch of a large and close-knit family and stressed moral values and education.

"He was a man of few words," Schultz said. "He wouldn't say much unless he wanted to make a point, but then he really made a point. If you had done something wrong, he would talk your ear off until you said, 'Okay, you're right.' "

He served as a eucharistic minister at St. Joseph Catholic Church in West Tampa. "When he wasn't at the store or at home, he was at church," Schultz said. "If he wasn't married, he would have become a priest."

Mr. Hernandez shunned the spotlight, and even his family didn't know the extent to which he affected the community.

"After he died, we found all these plaques, honors from the mayor and things like that," Schultz said. "We never really knew, and he wouldn't have wanted us to talk about it. We can talk about it now."

Mr. Hernandez is survived by his wife, a daughter, Diane Scott, a son Richard Hernandez, and five grandchildren.

[Last modified August 31, 2006, 09:37:44]