Carmen Berra, the beloved wife of Yankee legend Yogi Berra, died Thursday night at the Crane’s Mill Assisted Living Facility in West Caldwell, N.J., near the couple’s longtime home in Montclair.
The couple, whose love affair spanned parts of eight decades, had celebrated their 65th wedding anniversary on Jan. 26; Carmen Berra’s death was the result of complications of a stroke she suffered earlier this year. She was 85.
Funeral services are scheduled for 10 a.m. on Tuesday at the Church of the Immaculate Conception in Montclair.
The woman beside the man behind the plate through some of the Yankees’ greatest moments, Carmen Berra was a fixture in Yankee alumni circles, as hugely popular as her husband with those who got to know her. Yankee manager Joe Girardi expressed the organization’s sadness about the loss.
“So nice always to be in her presence,” Girardi said. “She truly cared about so many people. It’s sad. We’re really going to miss her.”
Born Carmen Short in Missouri in 1928, Carmen Berra married Yogi on Jan. 26, 1949, when he was a 23-year-old catcher with the Yankees. They went on to raise three sons, Larry, Tim and Dale, and have 11 grandchildren. Dale Berra played for the Pirates and Yankees and Tim played for the then-Baltimore Colts.
“She died peacefully — she went the way she would have wanted to,” Larry Berra told the Daily News on Friday. “We’re grateful that she and Dad were able to spend some good time together (Thursday). I’m not just saying this because she was my mom, but she was one of the great women of all time.”
Yogi and Carmen Berra met in St. Louis in the late 1940s, following his first year with the Yankees after he had just returned from World War II and she was a waitress at Biggies, a St. Louis restaurant.
Carmen served Yogi lunch and he asked her name and whether she was married. Their first date was a hockey game in St. Louis. Berra proposed marriage by placing a ring on the table in front of Carmen while they dined at his family’s home.
When news of Carmen Berra’s passing reached the Yankees at spring training in Tampa, Girardi called it sad, calling Yogi Berra one of the most humble and approachable guys he’d ever been around.
“And Carmen happened to be the wife of one of the greatest baseball players ever, and probably as nice of a lady as you could ever be around,” Girardi said. “She was just a sweetheart.”
In recent years, Carmen Berra was instrumental in the operation of the Yogi Berra Museum on the campus of Montclair State University in Little Falls, N.J. On display there are some of the romantic letters Yogi sent to his wife from the various cities he traveled to while playing ball. She worked closely with the museum’s donors and helped organize fund-raising events.
Carmen Berra was known not only for her beauty but also for her quick wit and charming personality. Their love for and comfort with each other is apparent in photos of the two scattered throughout the museum, showing them in Catskill resort ballrooms, at ballpark celebrations and at home with their expansive family.
In an interview with News baseball columnist Bill Madden, Carmen Berra related how her husband once sent her an anniversary card signed, “Yogi Berra.” She said she was glad he signed it that way because it eliminated any confusion about all the other Yogis she knew.
“On behalf of the entire New York Yankees organization, we offer our deepest condolences to the Berra family,” Yankees managing general partner Hal Steinbrenner said in a statement. “Having known Yogi and Carmen for so long, it is almost impossible to imagine two people who complemented each other better than they did. We will always remember Carmen’s smile and sense of humor, and her kindness and generosity will be deeply missed by all who knew her.”
In the recently closed Broadway play “Bronx Bombers,” Peter Scolari and Tracy Shayne, who were married in 2013, starred as Yogi and Carmen.
A casting call for an understudy for the part of Carmen summed her up this way: “Character ages to 80s, petite, strong-willed, elegant, beautiful, Yogi’s wife of 30-60 years and the epitome of all that a Yankee wife should be. She exudes confidence without ever seeming pompous, and exemplifies the good citizen without ever appearing plain. She is dynamic, energetic, embodies sex appeal; men are attracted to her and women are drawn to her. A fashion maven, she has an instinct for saying, doing and wearing the right things at all the right times. All respect and admire her. Always in control. Must be 5’5″ and below.”
