Harry O'Neill

Who was Harry O'Neill?

Harry Mink O'Neill was a professional baseball player. O'Neill's entire major-league career consisted of two innings of one game for the Philadelphia Athletics in 1939, as a catcher. O'Neill was one of only two Major League Baseball players to die during World War II. The other was Elmer Gedeon. Both died at the age of 27.

O'Neill distinguished himself as a very gifted college athlete. At Gettysburg College, the 6-foot-3, 205-pounder sometimes called "Porkie," led the school's baseball, football and basketball teams to league championships. After graduation, he was the subject of a bidding war between two American League teams, eventually signing with his hometown A's.

After spending two years in the minor leagues, O'Neill enlisted in the Marine Corps in 1942, and rose to the rank of first lieutenant with the 25th Marine Regiment, 4th Marine Division. Fighting in Saipan, he was wounded in the shoulder by shrapnel, then treated for weeks back in the U.S. Soon after, he was shipped back to the Pacific, to Iwo Jima, where he was killed by a sniper. Among his surviving family was his young wife, Ethel McKay O'Neill.

In 1980, Harry M.