Enduring Legacies: Guy Mitchell was perfection on the lanes

Editor's note: This is part of an occasional series called "Enduring Legacies" about your neighbors and friends who have recently died. They weren't famous. However, within their otherwise ordinary lives, they were extraordinary.

CANTON – On a bowling lane, Guy Mitchell could be perfect.

He had a smooth, four-step approach. Never mind that he contorted his hand, twisting the ball through a figure-eight pattern during his back swing. That was unconventional. But his hand always returned to an ideal release position.

"I never saw him miss the pocket," said his daughter, Judith Simonson.

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The pocket, for a right-hander, is between the 1 and 3 pin, at the front of the pyramid-shaped rack of 10 pins. It's the optimum contact point for a strike. Generally, the more angle, and hook to the pocket, the better.

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Off the lanes, like most of us, Mitchell was less than perfect.

He was likable enough. And by all accounts he was good at his job as an industrial engineer at Timken. But there were times he could have been a better husband and father.

"My dad was absent a lot," Simonson said.

Mitchell divorced his first wife, Frances, when Judith and her brother, Richard, were kids. He remarried, then later in life lived with another woman. Ironically, he came full circle near the end.

Mitchell spent his last four months in the same Midway Avenue NE home that he and Frances had purchased in 1954 — living under the same roof as Simonson and 95-year-old Frances.

"He was a player," Frances said with a chuckle.

And a master with a bowling ball.

'Mitch didn't hook the ball a lot ... but he was so consistent.'

One of the best amateurs in Stark County and the state, Mitchell died late last month at age 95. Simonson is proud of her dad's accomplishments on the lanes, many of them cataloged forever in boxes filled with yellowed bowling publication and news clippings, plaques, trophies, rings and patches.

Growing up in St. Clairsville, Mitchell began bowling in a four-lane house in West Virginia. When he moved to Canton, he gradually got better, under the tutelage of local legend John Klonowski.

"Mitch didn't hook the ball a lot ... but he was so consistent," said 74-year-old Gary Rebillot, one of the area's best, who bowled with and against Mitchell for years in local leagues and tourneys.

Mitchell's resume includes: Greater Canton Bowling Association Hall of Fame in 1981; Ohio Sportsman Hall of Fame in 2007; a total of 23 perfect 300 games; appearances in ABC Nationals events for at least 40 years straight; and an average of 200 or better in most years, from the 1960s until neuropathy in his feet made him give it up about eight years ago.

His success was unique, perhaps, because of his longevity.

Mitchell was a premier bowler when hard rubber balls were the norm a half-century ago. He was at the top of his game when plastic, then urethane balls took over, and technical players such as Mitchell were often bested by power players who threw large hooks. He remained one of the toughest competitors when even more powerful resin balls and two-handed players came on the scene.

The last 300

"He was a down and in player," explained former teammate 78-year-old Ed Miller, who often bowled on Mitchell's team. "His biggest nemesis was the 10-pin. Fortunately, he was a good spare-shooter."

Miller said Mitchell never practiced much, though he usually bowled in at least three or four leagues a week.

"He was just a natural," Miller said.

On Sept, 30, 2010, Mitchell rolled 12 strikes in a row, for his final 300 game — at age 84.

He posted the score at 77 Colonial Lanes during the Rolando's-Budweiser Senior Traveling league. It made him the oldest person in Stark County to bowl a perfect game, and one of the 10 oldest all-time nationwide.

Old bowling records are sketchy, but it was believed Mitchell became one of four bowlers in the country with sanctioned perfect games in six different decades. Mitchell shared the honor with Canton's Bill Gaume, Akron's Tom Suchan and PBA Hall of Famer Bob Strampe.

"Funny thing is, my dad thought he could have been a better golfer than bowler," Simonson said.

He was pretty good at that, too.

He carded three holes-in-one — but that's another story.