So what do you do during the summer when you’re the daughter of one of softball’s great players? Well, you go to a lot of softball games, of course. Jayne Zolna started attending her dad, Eddie’s, games when she was ten. She was the batgirl when her brother wasn’t there. When she got older, her dad gave her the cardboard top of the softball box so that she could keep score. She saw and scored many great games at Clarendon and Kelly Parks. She never received perfect attendance honors at school because of the Labor Day national tournaments the Bobcats played in. They won thirteen of them, so her father would let her stay home on the Tuesday following Labor Day to celebrate these Bobcat victories. At Kennedy Park her duties expanded when her dad taught her how to chart the hitting tendencies of opposing batters. Jayne had the privilege of watching the children of many great players turn into great players themselves. She also saw some of softball’s greatest characters. She once had to wash Jeff Hornacek’s (before his basketball days) Bobcat’s jersey because his father wouldn’t let him bring it in the house. His father, John (HOF), played first base for the Cat’s legendary foe, the Sobies. She watched future White Sox pitcher Kevin Hickey play the outfield and she traveled on Ron Olesiak’s (HOF) motorcycle from Kennedy Park to Lake Shore Park for Sunday double-headers. Ron would become an NBA referee. She also found two friends in Rich Melman (HOF) and Joel Zimberoff during the heyday years of the Lettuce Entertain You teams. In 1976, when her father was hospitalized, she helped Bobcats manager Bo Joens when they won the nationals in South Dakota. Jayne graduated from Providence High School. She lives in Frankfort with her parents, Ed and Lorraine, and works at a market research firm in Mokena. She thanks the Holan family for this honor. With this award, she joins her father and her uncle Eddie Zaitz as members of the Hall of Fame.
