The elderly elite of Kansas City share their life journeys, what motivated them along the way, the lucky breaks and tough times, and advice for staying active and relevant in their later years.
Written by David Hodes
Interviewed by David M. Block, David Hodes and Pete Mundo
George Toma
Birth date: February 2, 1929, Age: 96
“I always did the job and then some. You have to give it a little extra. The extra distinguishes the mediocre from the great.”
To say that retired professional sports groundskeeper George Toma was a world-class leader in his chosen profession is simply not going far enough. The man was so much more in his 40 years of dedicated work. Even now, in his 90s, he still gets calls about his work. He still helps. He loves doing it.
All the old-timers—the coaches, the stadium managers, the players—remember those times when Toma was counted on to make whatever field he found himself managing work for whoever wanted it to work, in rain or snow, in 100-plus heat or double-digit below-zero cold.
Toma has been called the “Sultan of Sod,” the “Nitty Gritty Dirt Man” and the “Sodfather.” And probably a few other more choice names from the people who experienced his wrath. He remains to this day a man of great insight into people and their motivations. He also maintains a serious point-perfect vision of working on all sorts of natural grass turf.
The Nonstop Marathon
Toma’s work life was a nonstop marathon. The game or the event was always coming right up. The weather could be a major factor. The grass could be a major factor. The crew could be a major factor.
All of which could make it impossible to meet the deadlines—but not with Toma in charge. He got it done in time, and he got it done right.
Toma expected perfection if you were on his crew because the people he reported to expected perfection. And Toma delivered.
But if you messed up, he’d chew you out. He’d dress you down. He’d make you understand what’s at stake as a groundskeeper for the pros he works for. Groundskeeping was serious science in service of simple practicality.
“I was a little earthquake sometimes,” Toma says. “Or a little volcano. There’s a lot in me. You can ask NFL Commissioner Roger Goodell. He had a good ass chewing from me—a very good one. Because he didn’t care about the players. I went on national television and chewed him out. Why? Because for all my years in the game, I was fighting for the cheapest insurance for an athlete from preschool all the way up to the professional level. And that is a safe playing field.”
For the first Super Bowls under Pete Rozelle, NFL commissioner from 1960 to 1989, there were excellent fields, Toma says. “When Roger Goodell took over, the groundskeeper that took over working for him got caught stealing sod.”
Toma says Goodell was working with a third set of staff over the last 17 years that “didn’t do the job. Instead of the fields getting better, they were getting worse.”
On the Job
The players knew the difference. They didn’t want to slip and slide around on poorly maintained turf and get so badly hurt it could end their career. Toma was in charge, man, and when he’s on the job, the job gets done right.
Toma says that at the Super Bowl, with his people working with the stadium people, everybody worked as one big family. “You have to make friends with all types of people,” he says. “There’s always good people and there’s bad people, too. I always had a way of getting along with new people.”
The students at Lincoln High School and Central High School were the grounds crew for Municipal Stadium in the early days of the Kansas City Athletics when Charlie Finley was the owner. “They were famous all around the league,” Toma says. “They made me. I wouldn’t be sitting here talking to you if it wasn’t for those and a few other people.”
That crew could roll out a tarp over the baseball field in 45 seconds, Toma says.
Toma knows all about hard work. He’s from coal country, born and raised in Edwardsville, Pennsylvania. When he was 10 years old, his dad died of black lung disease. Toma had to step up. “In those days, you had to get a job,” he says. “Everybody was poor. Eight year old kids were already working in the mines, and some were killed by being kicked by the mules. They worked with the mules because they led the coal cars down the mine.”
Toma got a job on a vegetable farm. He earned 10 cents an hour picking tomatoes for 10 hours a day, six days a week.
Ground-level Groundskeeping
Up the street lived a guy who was the groundskeeper for the farm team of the Cleveland Indians. So in 1942, as a senior in high school, Toma got a job with him. Toma was made head groundskeeper a few years later, and the rest is history.
Toma was groundskeeper at Municipal Stadium for the KC Athletics, the Royals, and the Chiefs through the 1960s. When the Harry S. Truman Sports Complex opened (in 1972 for the Chiefs and 1973 for the Royals), Toma worked as groundskeeper for both. He worked 57 Super Bowls from 1967 to 2023.
Toma was honored by the Pro Football Hall of Fame in 2001. He was inducted into the Major League Baseball Groundskeepers Hall of Fame on January 8, 2012, the same year he was inducted into the Kansas City Royals Hall of Fame.
Toma’s work life was exhausting. He was on the road, busy, barking orders, getting crews ready to do their best. It took a toll.
“You have to have time for your family,” Toma says. “I didn’t have much time, so my three children were more or less raised up on a baseball field. They’d come and stay with me and work with me.” His son Chip eventually became the head groundskeeper for the Minnesota Twins.
“I could have gone to Yankee Stadium or White Sox or some other places,” Toma says. “But I fell in love with this town. I didn’t want to live in a big city.”
Stories and Legacy
Toma has great stories, like the time the Beatles came to Municipal Stadium in September, 1964. “I made good friends with some of the Beatles,” he says. “They dressed in my shed in center field on a dirt floor with one toilet. It rained a little bit and we only had a small stage. They brought the Beatles into the stadium in an old Budweiser beer truck so the fan girls wouldn’t know. The grass was a little wet, so they had to go across the grass and over the red warning track. Chip got some poster board so when they stepped down out of the shack, their footprints were red on the poster board. They autographed it for him. Ringo Starr gave him his drumsticks.”
Toma’s legacy continues locally. Students from Central High School are starting a foundation under his name for students who become groundskeepers or have a lawn business. “I love to help people,” Toma says. “I mean, you can still mess me up, but I’ll still love you and help you. I don’t dislike anybody.”
Plenty of people have seen Toma get into it with somebody on the crew. “But 15 minutes later, I’m with that man with a cup of coffee,” he says. “If you don’t want to learn, don’t come near me. If you don’t want to do the job, don’t come near me.”
“You have to make friends with all types of people.”
“I mean, you can still mess me up, but I’ll still love you and help you. I don’t dislike anybody.”
