About Inductee

Everett A. Bud Lively was born in Birmingham in 1925, but has lived in Huntsville for more than four decades. His father, pitcher Jack Lively, played 11 years of professional baseball, beginning in 1905 with the Huntsville, Ala., team. In 1911, the senior Lively signed with the Detroit Tigers and became a close friend of future Baseball Hall of Famer Ty Cobb. He pitched for the Detroit Tigers from 1911-14. Bud Livelys own promising baseball career was put on hold by World War II. Drafted in 1943, he served with Pattons Third Army in an anti-aircraft weapons battalion. After the war, Lively returned to baseball and eventually made it to the major leagues in 1947. He pitched on a Cincinnati Reds staff that included Ewell The Whip Blackwell, Johnny Double No-Hit Vander Meer and Bucky Walters. A shoulder injury cut short his big league career after five years. Lively went on to a second career in Civil Service, working 28 years for the Department of the Army and for NASA at Redstone Arsenal. He received many awards and honors while working in the space program, beginning with the early days of the Apollo project and continuing through the first manned lunar landing, the Skylab program, the Apollo-Soyuz test program and the early days of the Space Shuttle. Lively has also been a member of many organizations over the years, including the U.S. Army Reserve, the American Legion, Veterans of Foreign Wars, the Masonic Blue Lodge, Order of Eastern Star, Scottish Rite, Cahaba Shrine, Baseball Assistance Team, Major League Baseball Players Alumni Association and Valley Hill Country Club.