Kenneth Turcott has watched more than a few players make their way from The Bronx to the Hall of Fame in Cooperstown with his own two eyes during eight-plus decades of Yankees fandom.
From Joe DiMaggio to Derek Jeter, he has seen them all.
These days, at age 91, he doesn’t have to go far to enjoy his own Yankees hallway of fame, one he’s cultivating in his home in Pompton Plains, N.J., with the help of the New York Post’s Yankee Poster Series sponsored by Montefiore Einstein.
collection during the Yankees season. Courtesy of Mary Sottile
Each Thursday, Turcott, a Post subscriber, removes the artwork from the center of the newspaper.
Aided by daughters Mary Sottile and Margaret Ohnikian and three of his grandsons, he has assembled an exhibit that now includes 19 posters, 13 Yankees caps, a banner and a jersey.
“Everything about them is very nice and very interesting,” Turcott said of the posters, which feature stars such as Aaron Judge, Juan Soto and Gerrit Cole as well as three-homer rookie sensation Ben Rice and trade-deadline pickup Jazz Chisholm Jr. There’s also a tribute to David Cone’s perfect game from 1999. “They’re definitely collectibles. I’ve been getting a lot of enjoyment from them.”
The Yankees have been near the center of Turcott’s universe since he was a child growing up in Milford, Conn.
Each summer up to the beginning of high school, he’d visit his aunt in Great Neck, N.Y., who had box seats next to the Yankees dugout.
He confidently rattles off the names of his childhood favorites — Joe D., Charlie Keller, Tommy Henrich, Bill Dickey.
“All those good guys,” he says. “They were very proficient in winning.”
decades of his life. Courtesy of Mary Sottile
Turcott graduated in 1954 from Franklin and Marshall College, where he participated in the ROTC program.
That led him to a 12-year career in the Air Force, flying C-135 transport planes.
This was followed by 26 years as a pilot for American Airlines.
All the while, Turcott and his wife of 66 years, Carol, who died in 2022, were growing a Yankee fan army of their own.
The couple had eight children — six girls, two boys … all pinstripes.
There are 23 grandchildren and 14 great grandchildren, almost all of whom have maintained the faith.
“One of my daughters [Margaret] managed to marry a Mets fan and he’s brainwashing his three boys,” Turcott said of Andrew, Justin and Connor Ohnikian. “A couple of them have been going to Yankee games with their Yankee-[fan] friends, and I think we might get them back in line little by little.”
Turcott says the rivalry with his grandsons never gets heated and is just enough to keep things fun.
“We don’t do too much razzing but [Andrew] will call me up and let me know what the score is when the Yankees lose and I go back at him and tell him how many games the Mets are out of first place,” Turcott said.
“We argue about the Mets and Yankees almost every day. We’re always talking about baseball,” said Andrew, 21. “It’s really cool to hear him tell stories about the old Yankees, even the old Mets. Every time an old player [is mentioned on the broadcast], he’ll always have a story about him.”
