Joseph A. Forcelli Sr., baseball teacher

Joseph A. Forcelli, 90, a gifted athlete and locally renowned teacher of the game of baseball, died on Wednesday, June 25, at Danbury Hospital. He had lived in Bethel for the past year, but had made his home in the Branchville section of Ridgefield nearly all his long life.
“He was a very good athlete and a very good ballplayer,” said Dom D’Addario, who lived for many years in Branchville. “He was sort of an instructor; he would teach guys how to play ball. He was very good. He used to play every position on the team, and played them all well.”
Mr. Forcelli was born in Yonkers, N.Y., on June 23, 1913, a son of the late Antonio and Antoinette DiBerardino Forcelli. His father came originally from Abruzzi region of Italy, and his parents moved from Yonkers to Ridgefield when he was young. He grew up the Branchville area, playing ball with his three brothers Peter, John and the late James Forcelli. The family also included two sisters, now Edith Dodd and Anna Frulla.
Mr. Forcelli worked for more than 40 years as a machinist at the Gilbert and Bennett Manufacturing Company in Georgetown. “My uncle Joe worked there from when he was 16 to 62,” said his nephew Tony Forcelli of Ridgefield. “He worked in the wire mill his entire life, as my other uncle, Pete, did.”
Joseph Forcelli was a man with a natural affinity for young people, his nephew said.
“With kids, he was great. When we were younger he had the only ’56 Chevy in Branchville, and took all us kids to the stock car races every Saturday night. He did that for years,” Tony Forcelli recalled. “He was our chauffeur, really — he was for all the kids in the neighborhood, or who played ball, because he coached.”
Baseball was his legacy, his nephew said.
“He had huge hands, so he was able to throw a curveball very easily,” he said.
In October 1992, Mr. Forcelli was honored by the Ridgefield Old Timers Association as an excellent player — a leading hitter every year, as well as a gifted and versatile fielder. In the 1940s, he played with the well-known Ridgefield Motors team managed by Leo Pambianchi, who considered Mr. Forcelli the best player he ever managed. The Old Timers also honored him as a well-respected teacher of baseball who turned out some of the best players from the Ridgefield area.
“They called him ‘the professor’,” his nephew said. “Three or four of his players got offered professional contracts.”
Top local players who learned from Branchville’s professor of baseball included his brother, John Forcelli, Vin Petrini, and Gino Cingolani, who played for a time in the old New York Giants organization, Tony Forcelli said.
Mr. Forcelli also played hockey for the Redding Rangers and the Norwalk Hockey Club in the 1930s. He was a better than average bowler, and after his retirement could be found playing golf most weekdays.
Survivors include his two sons, Joseph A. Forcelli Jr. and Peter J. Forcelli, both of Bethel; two sisters, Edith Dodd of Vermont and Anne Frulla of Washington, Conn.; two brothers, John Forcelli of Ridgefield and Peter Forcelli of Vermont; and two grandsons, Christopher and Peter Forcelli.
The Rev. Mark E. Grimes, parochial vicar, celebrated a Mass of Christian Burial Monday, June 30, in Sacred Heart Church, Georgetown. Burial was private.
The Bouton Funeral Home in Georgetown handled arrangements.