Sports Complex Named for Bobby Eleuterius
Bobby Eleuterius, former Harrison County Supervisor and School Board member reluctantly walked onto one of the ball fields at D’Iberville’s Recreational Complex Wednesday evening, May 28 as little league players, parents, coaches and city officials looked on. Eleuterius thanked everyone for the honor, just bestowed on him, the renaming of the complex, the Bobby Eleuterius Recreational Complex. His voice choked a little as he spoke with humble sincerity and said he was deeply honored by the lasting gesture. “I didn’t want to go up and say anything,” he said later, “because I knew I was going to get emotional.”
Eleuterius is credited by many in D’Iberville and the county with a number of accomplishments. Upon his retirement in 2007 the Miss. state legislature passed a concurrent resolution (#626) honoring his 33 years of public service. He is credited with raising the status and role of county government, calling it the oldest and closest form of government and elevating the level of service it can provide to the people in its border.
Of the many accomplishments he is credited with from, the paving of 33 miles of county dirt roads, building tourism and economic development to bringing higher paying jobs to the area and building parks and senior citizen centers, the completion of the D’Iberville Sports Complex is the one closest to Eleuterius’ heart. “It’s the most important one,” he said, “It’s my baby.”
His passion for building the state of the art complex is a result, no doubt, of his passion for the game of baseball. “I played sports as a kid,” he explained, “some football, a little boxing, but it was baseball that I liked the most. I played softball until I was 42. Sometimes I played catcher and other times short stop or center field,” he said. Eleuterius took that love of the game and committed much of his life to teaching it to others. He was a coach for 18 years and worked tirelessly to provide children with a high quality place to learn and play in. “It’s a joy to watch these kids play in a facility like this,” he said.
As he sat on one of the bleachers at a baseball Eleuterius looked around with pride and spoke about how the complex was built with special attention given to special details only a baseball player might think of. “I just checked the plaque up there. [points to top of press box] It was completed in 1999. It’s almost 10 years old and it still looks great. You know, that year this complex was chosen as one of the top 10 in the southeast because of the way we built it. We took special care by choosing these bleachers. The benches in the dug out are slanted at an angle instead of a straight 90°. They’re more comfortable that way. The dugouts have phones in them. That field there, [points to an adjacent ball field] we had to haul in dirt to raise it 5 feet up for play and to allow runoff. We put in an extra $180,000 drainage system under the fields. When most little league teams are not playing, they’re playing here because of the drainage system. There’s a recording system in the press box and you can see any where in the facility for security. We gave the concession kitchen the best equipment. With tennis courts, a tennis pavilion and bathrooms, four ball fields, a football field and a walking track, we built this facility to last,”Eleuterius said.
Retired now, Eleuterius and his wife still follow the little league games, traveling with them when they go out of town, even attending 11 little league world series events. He was there when D’Iberville came close to a world series win before a Lafayette, La. team pulled out an 11th-hour home run, defeating D’Iberville by one point. Eleuterius said he’s looking forward to seeing the day that a D’Iberville little league team brings home a world series win.
The pride Eleuterius has for his local players and the facility that now bears his name is mirrored in the faces of local civic leaders such as Harrison County Supervisor Windy Swetman who introduced him and gave his plague, Parks and Recreation Director Mike Mullen, Council members Teddy Hardy, Henry Toncrey and Glenn Ellis and City Manager Richard Rose, all of whom watched with pride as the complex was officially renamed. And in the coming weeks, a new, carved wooden sign will grace the entrance of the Bobby Eleuterius Recreation Complex.
By Nicole LaCour Young
Communications Officer, City of D’Iberville
