George Herman "Babe" Ruth. In August 1947, the sports legend was serving as a consultant to American Legion Baseball. He was present at the final game of the 1947 championship tournament – played in Los Angeles – in which Robert Bentley Post 50 of Cincinnati emerged victorious. Ruth presented the tournament trophy and gave each player a Spalding baseball with his autograph on it.

Among the players on the Post 50 team were Jim Frey, the former Cubs manager/executive and Don Zimmer, who had a 60-plus-year baseball career as a player and executive before his death in 2014.

At the time, Ruth was battling throat cancer. He died just under a year later, in August 1948, at 53. In 1949, he received a posthumous Distinguished Service Medal from the Legion for his work with American Legion Baseball.