Baby name story: Drungo

Minor league baseball player Drungo Hazewood — an outfielder for the Rochester Red Wings in the early 1980s — was born in Mobile, Alabama, in 1959. New York Times columnist Dan Barry told the story behind Drungo’s unusual first name in his 2011 book Bottom of the 33rd:

His mother, Catherine, was a housewife who gave her life to raising ten children and helping to rear who knows how many grandchildren. With her ninth about to be born, Catherine announced a dare: Whoever wins a foot race to the hospital gets to name the baby. Her son Aubrey won the challenge, and he had a good friend whose last name was Drungo. So Drungo Hazewood it was.

Makes me very curious how she named the tenth. :)

P.S. The book is about baseball’s longest game, which was played in Rhode Island in 1981. Drungo participated, along with future Hall of Famers Wade Boggs and Cal Ripken.

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