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Pete Palma laughs with a colleague during a break between innings at Heritage Park Softball Complex. Mr. Palma has been a dedicated softball umpire for 50 years.

It happened during one of the state softball tournament games he umpired, Pete Palma remembered. A base runner came barreling down from second base and crash landed into the third baseman. That was against the rules. And everyone knows that Pete Palma knows the rules like he wrote the book. They know he doesn’t back down from a call either.

“I booted him, and we got into a little argument,” Mr. Palma said. He turned around and said, ‘I’ll tell you what, fat boy, I’ll be waiting for you after the game.’”

The man left. An inning and a half later he was back in the stands glaring down at home plate.

Mr. Palma answered by forfeiting the game.

“The guy said, ‘What the hell you forfeit that ball game for?’” Mr. Palma said. “I said, ‘Partner you told me you’d be waiting for me, and I didn’t want to keep you waiting.’”

Boyd Koch, who once served as co-chief umpire with Mr. Palma, can tell lots of stories about his close friend. Here’s one:

“Pete was umpiring a game and one fellow didn’t like the call and Pete booted him out,” Mr. Koch said. “The guy said, ‘You know I cussed that umpire out in Spanish, and he kicked me out in English.’”

There’s not a softball field in St. Joseph that Mr. Palma hasn’t set foot on. There aren’t many softball games played here where he hasn’t played a part. Whether umpiring a game, scheduling other umpires or running a state tournament, Mr. Palma is a fixture in St. Joseph softball.

The 74-year-old Mr. Palma was recently honored for 50 years serving as softball umpire. Mr. Koch said it is an honor only a few obtain in the state of Missouri.

“We both worked 50 years. He’s only about the sixth one to do that. I’m the fourth one,” he said. “I retired in 1992, my 50th year, and (Pete) said he was bound and determined to work this year to tie me.”

Being an umpire was about the furthest thing from Mr. Palma’s mind when he was a youngster growing up in south Omaha, Neb. The ninth of Pedro and Julia’s 13 children, his thoughts were on staying in school — or trying not to.

“I started skipping and pretty soon they kicked me out, they didn’t want me back,” Mr. Palma said.

The packing industry was booming in Omaha in the 1950s. Mr. Palma got a job working at Wilson Packing for six years before moving to Armour Packing Co. in 1958.

Armour was a big packing house outfit Mr. Palma remembered, with about 4,000 employees. And it had its own softball league. Someone asked him to play.

“I love to play all sports, but I couldn’t hit a damn softball,” Mr. Palma said.

He found himself at the plate one day with his team tied in the seventh inning and needing a run. He struck out. That’s when his life changed.

“I threw the bat down and said, ‘to hell with this game’ and the umpire heard me and said ‘why are you being like that?,” Mr. Palma said. “Then he said, ‘I’m umpiring by myself, why don’t you come help me next game?’”

He did. Soon he was umpiring regularly in the Armour league. From there he joined the city’s umpiring association and began umpiring city league games as well. When Armour closed in Omaha in 1968, Mr. Palma moved his wife, Carmen, and their two sons Pete Jr. and Rick to St. Joseph to work at the plant here.

It was an easy move. His wife’s family was from St. Joseph and Mr. Palma’s reputation as a fair and good umpire followed him. “A fella by the name of Manny Hoard was in charge. I came down here, and he put me to work the next day,” Mr. Palma said.

He started out umpiring fastpitch softball in St. Joseph. In his very first St. Joseph game, he made a call at home that someone didn’t like.

“He said ‘Boy you don’t give up nothing and I said ‘I don’t give you nothing; You’re going to earn what you get,’” Mr. Palma said. “After that time, everybody started wanting me to come back.”

Mr. Palma did fastpitch a few more years until he learned in slowpitch you didn’t have to put on the mask and all the other umpiring equipment.

He became a co-umpire chief for slowpitch softball in 1969. In 1981 he became chief umpire for the first national softball tournament in St. Joseph. He was hired as umpire scheduler in 1985, scheduling games for umpires for the city of St. Joseph. It’s a position Mr. Palma still holds today. It’s also one he plans to give up sometime next year.

He’s seen days when the city didn’t have enough games for 100 umpires. Today there’s often not enough umpires for all the games. He scheduled 34 umpires this year.

“This is high for the last four or five years, but they don’t stay,” he said. “That’s hard to understand. How many places in St. Joseph pay $15 an hour?”

Mr. Palma has also seen his share of good St. Joseph softball players in 50 years. The names Tim Reynolds, “Rumpy” Lucas, Charles, Leo and Bobby Blakely come quickly to mind.

“Charlie Pusateri is probably one of the best all-around ballplayers I’ve seen anywhere,” he said. “He was a shortstop who covered more ground than anybody.”

Mr. Pusateri remembers Mr. Palma as one of the nicest guys around and a pretty darn good umpire, too.

“He worked his way up to top notch. He is a straight shooter,” he said.

A year from now, Mr. Palma won’t be seen much on St. Joseph softball fields. He said he may umpire a game or two but three, sometimes five games a night, is too much now.

He’ll spend some days helping out in his son Rick Palma’s restaurant. But most days he’ll umpire fights between his grandchildren.

“The way they like to fight I like to get out of here,” Mr. Palma laughs. “No, the kids ain’t that bad. I’ll just be around here and do a lot of walking. Ever since they told me to start walking, I do a lot of that.”

Alonzo Weston can be reached at alonzow@npgco.com.