Berlin High School Athletic Hall of Fame
Ed Maguda
Edward Maguda graduated from Berlin High in 1937. He played baseball for the first three years of the start of the program, being selected as a co-captain his senior year. He also played two years of football starting in the 2nd year of the program being organized at Berlin High. In basketball as in football he started in the school’s 2nd year and played for two years before graduating. He was one of Berlin’s first three sport athletes and the Berlin Beacon referred to him as the second Babe Ruth because of his baseball prowess. In addition to his playing varsity baseball and basketball he also played on the intramural teams at the same time.
After graduating Edward played with the Kensington Maroons semi-pro baseball team which would typically play before 1000 fans at Percival playing field.
In 1941 he joined the Navy serving on the aircraft carrier USS Wasp as a deck gunner which on 9/15/1942 while on patrol in the South Pacific covering operations for convoys and resupply units headed to Guadalcanal was stuck by Japanese torpedoes with the loss of 193 shipmates, while 171 officers and 1,798 enlisted men survived.
After leaving the service in 1945 he played fast pitch softball for Villa Garden Restaurant for 5 years as their catcher. Edward worked at Pratt and Whitney in Southington for 24 years before passing away in 1997.
