Hanford High's beloved ‘Father Falcon’ remembered fondly

Glenn Meinke spent decades teaching and coaching at four schools.

But mostly, his name is synonymous with Hanford High School.

“If there was a Mount Rushmore of Hanford coaches, he’d be on that,” said Jeff Bumgarner, a former first-round pick of the Minnesota Twins in 1985. “He was Father Falcon.”

Meinke passed away on Sept. 26 at the age of 92.

That Father Falcon reference couldn’t be more true.

The moniker, says his daughter, Peri Hall, couldn’t be more apt.

“He loved that school,” said Hall.

Meinke had coached the school’s football team for four seasons starting in the second year of its existence. He was for years the public address announcer at basketball games.

And he had two stints as head baseball coach.

“If you cut Glenn’s arm, I think he would bleed purple and gold (the school’s colors),” said one former athletic director.

Love of baseball

And baseball was his first love.

Former players always referred to his little yellow pickup truck out at the school’s baseball field, as he lovingly tended to the field.

“Meinke spent a ton of time at that field,” said Mike Miles, a former player for Meinke who would also end up being his assistant coach for years at both Hanford and summer ball. “When we started out there it was nothing. My junior year, we finally got a backstop out there.”

That was the early 1970s.

Later, as his assistant, Miles saw another side to Meinke.

“I learned a ton from Glenn,” said Miles, who owns Milestones Athletic Supply in Richland. “He was so quiet. Then you hear him talk to a kid. I thought ‘Holy cow! You know a lot more than what you let on.’ He was about fundamental baseball. He also had a lot of one-liners, and he’d have the kids in stitches. Everybody liked him. But he was not one of those idle chatter people.”

Phil Jones is a Richland High School grad who played professional baseball in the 1970s.

“My recollections of coach go back to when I just finished playing pro baseball and returned and had a job with the Richland School District,” said Jones. “Glenn hired me right off to be an assistant coach with him and do the JV team at Hanford. I was allowed a free hand in coaching up some of the newer ideas that I learned in pro baseball.”

Jones said the program had very few assets. It didn’t matter though.

“But Glenn was absolutely dedicated to Hanford baseball,” said Jones. “We didn’t have much money then, so we got by with very little. But what we had was all due to Glenn’s efforts.”

Meinke was always at the field with his little yellow pickup truck, “always tinkering and doing something to improve the field.”

Even when Meinke lost his baseball coaching job at Hanford in 1978, it was hard not to feel for him.

Challenging times

Meinke’s team was playing tiny Bridgeport in a doubleheader, and to keep the games close, he elected to use two ninth graders to pitch. At the time, ninth graders were considered junior high players, and Hanford had been in trouble in another sport already by the WIAA.

Hanford officials asked for Meinke’s resignation. The expectation was that he would sit out a year, then re-apply in 1979 for the job.

The only problem was his replacement, former WSU star Bobby Waits, turned the Falcons into another powerhouse. His teams would win six straight Mid-Valley League titles.

“Bobby came in and did such a good job, I didn’t apply again,” Meinke told the Herald in 1985.

In the fall of 1984, though, Waits passed away while battling cancer.

Meinke became the obvious choice to step in.

For Bumgarner, a senior that year, Meinke was a complete change from Waits.

“Waits was intense, kind of like Bobby Knight,” said Bumgarner. “Waits was super rigid and super intense. Guys still loved him. Meinke was super organized, but he was softer. ‘Gol’dangit’ might have been the worst thing he said.”

The Falcons would go on that season to win a state AA title.

But, Bumgarner adds, Meinke was the first to credit Waits for that team’s title.

In any case, it made it nicer when Meinke again led the Falcons to another state title in 1987.

Bumgarner, already two years into his professional baseball career by then, wasn’t surprised.

“Nothing he did was too high or too low,” said Bumgarner. “He trusted his players to do the job. Back then, you had just one or two coaches. Players were expected to police themselves.”

Around that time period, Hanford High had been rocked with the deaths of three of their coaches.

Besides Waits, wrestling coach Harold Surplus died from leukemia, while boys basketball coach Les Wyatt died by suicide.

“We were blessed with guys like John Morgan and Rich Sanders,” said Bumgarner. “Together with Meinke, they were all a calming presence for us.”

A player’s manager

Jason Repko first met Meinke as a freshman, turning out for summer ball.

“Meinke and Mike Miles were the coaches,” said Repko. “That’s when I realized how much the guy loved the game. He spent time with each guy to find out what they wanted to get out of that season.

Repko discussed his dreams of playing in the big leagues, while other guys were there to have fun with their friends.

“He wanted to know what each guy wanted,” said Repko. “I was impressed with his dedication.”

Repko said he told Meinke of his aspirations “and he knew what I needed. I wanted to be in the big leagues, and I wanted him to tell me what to do.

“Like any kid who was 12 years old, collected baseball cards, and had aspirations to play in the majors, that was my whole focus.”

Repko, an outfielder drafted by the Los Angeles Dodgers in the first round of the 1999 draft, would play all or parts of seven seasons in the majors with the Dodgers, Minnesota Twins and Boston Red Sox.

“He made such an impact on me,” Repko continued. “I think he was planning on retiring in 1998. But I was gonna be a senior that season. He wanted to coach me through that season.”

Meinke was a player’s manager.

Bumgarner was a big pitching prospect his senior year for the 1985 MLB Draft, and he still appreciates how Meinke handled the baseball scouts.

“Scouts would come in, and even though I had pitched the last game, they asked Glenn if I could throw a special bullpen that day for them,” said Bumgarner. “Glenn would come to me and ask, ‘What do you want to do?’ He handled me like an adult, and the scouts weren’t telling us what to do.”

Back in that day, there were no pitching counts. But Meinke wouldn’t damage Bumgarner’s future.

“We had plenty of pitching arms (including minor-leaguer Brad Smith). But he really protected us all,” said Bumgarner.

Repko also called Meinke the worst batting practice pitcher he ever faced.

“His elbow would drop. I don’t know if his shoulder had gotten tired from all of those years tossing batting practice,” said Repko. “But he would come at you like a submarine pitcher. The ball would get lost in the background of the L-shaped batting practice screen to protect the pitcher.”

Yet, it still somehow benefited Repko.

One time, in the majors, Repko faced Byung-hyun Kim — a submarine pitcher.

Repko ripped a pitch for a home run.

His teammates wanted to know what his secret was.

“I guarantee you I did this for three years in high school because that’s how my coach pitched,” he told them. “Glenn Meinke could not get his arm up.”

Repko, who played professionally for 17 years, made sure during his first 10 years in baseball that he would come home in each offseason and take Meinke and his wife out to dinner. Maybe go bowling, in which Meinke was a standout.

Bumgarner understands why Repko did that.

As a pitching coach assistant for the Hanford Falcons the last nine years, Bumgarner picked up a piece of philosophy that he got from Meinke and uses to this day.

“If players don’t come back after they’re gone, you’ve done something wrong,” said Bumgarner.

That’s who Father Falcon was.

Jeff Morrow is former sports editor for the Tri-City Herald.