Retirement From Baseball
Rogell spent the bulk of his “retirement” as a member of the Detroit City Council. After a brief stint in the minors as a player and coach, he returned to Detroit and began his civil service career in 1942. He would serve on the council, with a two-year break in the late forties, until 1980, playing a key role on the city’s planning commissions. “I think I did a lot for that city,” he would say after leaving his post. “I was chairman of the committee that built the big airport there. Also the roads and bridges committee.” The road entering Detroit's Metropolitan Airport from the north, Merriman Road, changes its name to William G. Rogell Drive as it enters the airport.
Rogell also used his position to help old ballplayers in the Detroit area. Former Tiger teammate Tommy Bridges (who came to the Tigers the same year as Rogell), a sober man throughout his career, started to drink while serving in World War II. After trying to restart his career with Tigers following the war Bridges moved on to the Pacific Coast League. His drinking became more and more prevalent until he finally collapsed drunk on the mound during a game. He divorced his wife, married a waitress from a bar he often visited, moved back to Detroit, and caught up with some of his old teammates.
Rogell, upset with the condition his former mate was in, lined up for Bridges a sales job in Detroit. Bridges never came to work, but Rogell did not hold any kind of resentment toward Bridges. “It was terrible to see that,” he said. “But nice guys go, too, you know.”
Numerous other former players also turned to Rogell when they had run out of options, and he always worked hard to try to provide them with whatever assistance he could.
Rogell, after leaving the council, spent the rest of his retirement in Detroit. At age 94 he threw out the first pitch at the final game at Tiger Stadium on September 27, 1999, nearly 70 years after he had debuted for the Tigers in the same park.
Billy Rogell died of pneumonia at the age of 98 in the Detroit suburb of Sterling Heights.
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