Sunday, October 21, 2001

By Ervin Dyer, Post-Gazette Staff Writer

Hugh Noyes Mulcahy, a pitcher for the Philadelphia Phillies and the Pirates, died of complications of cancer and pneumonia Friday at Aliquippa Hospital. He was 88.

Mr. Mulcahy, of Beaver, spent most of his professional career with the Phillies. He was named to the All-Star team in 1940.

With the Phillies for eight years, he became known as "Losing Pitcher" Mulcahy when he lost 76 games over four seasons.

In 1947, he played for the Pirates briefly, pitching for the team from spring training until Mother's Day.

The year after making the All-Star team, at age 27, Mr. Mulcahy went to war. He was the first major leaguer to be drafted. He was assigned to the 101st Artillery at Camp Edwards on Cape Cod, Mass. He also served with the Army in the Pacific theater, where he won a Bronze Star.

When called, Mr. Mulcahy said, "I'm 100 percent in favor of military training. I'm ready to serve." He was drafted about 10 months before Pearl Harbor and served for 4 1/2 years. After the service, he played two more seasons for the Phillies.

Mr. Mulcahy was born on Sept. 9, 1913, in Brighton, Mass. He attended high school in Boston and immediately went into professional baseball.

When his career as a player came to an end, he became a pitching coach for the Chicago White Sox. Between 1950 and 1976, when he retired, he also served as a scout and director of the minor league training camp for the White Sox.

In Beaver, where he and his wife, Ruth Hamilton Mulcahy, made their home throughout his career, he was a member of the First Presbyterian Church, the Fort McIntosh Club and Deer Trails Country Club.

He was a retired member of the Major League Players Association.

For more than 15 years, he delivered for Meals on Wheels, where most of his clients were younger than he was.

In addition to his wife, he is survived by two sons, Hugh of Conway and David of Beaver, and six grandchildren and three great-grandchildren.

Friends will be received from noon to 3 p.m. today and from 2 to 4 and 7 to 9 p.m. tomorrow in the J.T. Anderson Funeral Home, 205 College Ave., Beaver.

Services will be held at 11 a.m. Tuesday in the First Presbyterian Church, 252 College Ave., Beaver. Interment will follow in Beaver Cemetery. Memorial contributions can be made to Meals on Wheels, 1098 Third St., Beaver, PA 15009.