Early Life
Wilhelm played high school baseball in Huntersville, North Carolina. There, he began experimenting with a knuckleball after reading about Dutch Leonard.
Wilhelm served in the United States Army in the European Theater during World War II. Wilhelm participated in the Battle of the Bulge, where he was wounded, earning the Purple Heart for his actions. He rose to the rank of Staff Sergeant. Because of his military service, he was nicknamed "Ol' Sarge".
Read more about this topic: Hoyt Wilhelm
Famous quotes containing the words early life, early and/or life:
“... goodness is of a modest nature, easily discouraged, and when much elbowed in early life by unabashed vices, is apt to retire into extreme privacy, so that it is more easily believed in by those who construct a selfish old gentleman theoretically, than by those who form the narrower judgments based on his personal acquaintance.”
—George Eliot [Mary Ann (or Marian)
“The early Christian rules of life were not made to last, because the early Christians did not believe that the world itself was going to last.”
—George Bernard Shaw (1856–1950)
“You know all my life I’ve hated funerals. The fuss and bother never brings anybody back. It just spoils remembering them as they really are. And when I see people actually facing it that way, I have to act like a sap.”
—Jules Furthman (1888–1960)