What’s in a nickname?

Nicknames often come and go from prep days to professional levels,

but two still endure from the days of Harbor High athletes.

The one still holding firm over the years, mainly from the world

of yesteryear sportswriters, is “The Bird.” That name came to Newport

grad George Yardley during his gigantic years as a major professional

basketball star for the Detroit Pistons. He broke the all-time pro

scoring record for one season with 2,001 points in 1958. He was

subsequently drawn into the pro Hall of Fame in Springfield, Mass.

There is no recall of any nickname from prep days from 1942-46 at

Harbor High. He was “The Bird” long before Michael Jordan came into

the pro game. They both know how to “fly” through the air to reach a

bucket with dazzle.

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Another name had a big league link from the ‘40s with Boyd (Bogey)

Horrell, Class of ‘48, but it didn’t start with athletics. It came

from a relationship to a big name out of the cinema world: Humphrey

Bogart.

Horrell and his late dad, Charley Harlow Horrell, used to work for

Bogart in the early days aboard his nifty yacht off Balboa Island at

Richardson’s Yacht Anchorage.

Young Horrell came to know the real “Bogey” and carried the utmost

regard for the famed Hollywood actor.

With amusement, Horrell, who has sold his Arizona farm and moved

to Huntington Beach, recalled that one day the word got around his

pals and they started joking with him.

Horrell recalled that if his friends thought he was being

assertive or pushy “they would start saying, ‘Who do you think you

are, Bogey?’” And it would draw a round of laughs.

The nickname took hold in high school athletic days and stuck. He

said people still call him “Bogey” to this day.

It is fair to say that probably only the younger day gang would

recall the original connect with Bogart.

Nonetheless, Horrell made big marks in athletic years at Harbor

and Orange Coast College.

He became the leading hitter for the only baseball championship

that Newport ever had in 1948 in the Sunset League. He also excelled

in football and basketball. He made the history book in ’48 at OCC by

kicking the first-ever conversions for the Pirates in their first

game against Riverside College, winning, 14-6.

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Another nickname that endured in the ‘40s was Chief Wahoo, tacked

on a prized fullback named Bob Berry, who starred for the 1947-48

Sailors. It was drawn from a character in a newspaper comic strip. It

brought amusement often, but Berry didn’t. He had a thundering impact

when he plowed into opponents.

His ’47 coach, the late Wendell Pickens, once said, Berry had the

impact of the legendary Harold Sheflin, who starred for the champ ’42

team.

The name “Wahoo” faded after school days for Berry, but oldtimers

reflect back some times and refer to him as “The Wahoo Chief.”

Berry looks back on the moniker with little interest but was

amused by the comical nature of the episode.

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One nickname that endured for many years was “Lassie,” which was

identified with the great left-handed pitcher Frank Hamilton, who led

Newport to that first and only baseball title in 1948.

The late Hamilton hated the name, but all his fans loved it and

uttered it with regard.

The star pitcher, who was offered a $50,000 bonus to sign up with

the New York Yankees, once said a classmate, Dick Deaver, fouled up

in a basketball game and he chose to call him “Lassie.”

However, it didn’t hold and Deaver chose to start calling Hamilton

“Lassie” and it stuck, much to his annoyance.

And that is why he used to get irritated when others would call

him that.

In time, however, he came to see it had affected fans in Costa

Mesa Merchant games later as a seeming tribute his way.