Reaching the man took several contact attempts - through Facebook, the White Pages, his insurance-business address/phone and his daughter Carey's work connection at the KC FOX-4 television station. So, because I've written frequently about Shreveport baseball over five decades, the question was - in the tradition of the old Shreveport Journal series that produced many of our sports staff's best features in the 1980s - 'Whatever happened to Dave Wickersham?' He was a star for a season or two, decent and consistent in other seasons, and by 1969, when he somewhat surprisingly made the roster of the KC Royals (one of the American League's two expansion teams), just grateful for one last season.īy then, he also had established a second career - in insurance sales - and he had a life - a wife, a family, and a city/area he had come to love.Īnd a baseball team - the Royals - he could root for forever.

He was a major-league pitcher in each year of the 1960s. The next year, 1962, he stayed in the big leagues. In 19, he arguably was the Shreveport Sports' best pitcher and one of the best in the old Southern Association.Īt the end of each of those seasons, he was called up by the parent Kansas City Athletics.

But for those of us who were teenagers and baseball fans in Shreveport, La., as the 1960s began, the name - Dave Wickersham - is a familiar one. That is pertinent because of the current World Series, although his name might not resonate with current fans. In researching the Internet for a project concerning professional baseball in Shreveport, this item got our attention: Dave Wickersham is the oldest living former Kansas City Royals player.

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