When the mail came, she was there for Hank Aaron
The mail arrived daily, carrying the postmarks of small towns and return addresses from big cities.
Carla Koplin Cohn devoted herself to reading each letter. She organized the stacks of congratulatory notes and kept another pile for kids who sent baseball cards for Atlanta Braves slugger Henry “Hank” Aaron to autograph. There were categories for hate mail and racist comments. Still another was reserved for death threats, which she would report to the FBI.
It cost 10 cents to mail a letter in 1974, the year Aaron broke Babe Ruth’s revered home run record. In the year leading up to Aaron’s historic 715th homer, an estimated 900,000 letters had mail carriers working overtime on the postal routes to Atlanta Stadium.
It cost 55 cents to mail a letter now, although Carla knows she might be spending more time opening emails than envelopes if the Hall-of-Famer Aaron, who died on Jan. 22, had been swinging for the fences a half-century later.
Carla’s family owned and operated Macon Iron and Paper Stock, so it somehow seemed appropriate she would work for a man nicknamed the “Hammer.’’ She graduated from Miller High School for Girls in 1965, the year before the Braves moved from Milwaukee to Atlanta. She attended the University of Georgia for two years, then enrolled in a secretarial school in New York.
After putting down roots in Atlanta, where her career got off to a rather unfulfilling start, she decided to pursue job in sports. She had grown up going to baseball games with her grandfather and two brothers at Luther Williams Field, where Pete Rose and others cut their teeth with the minor-league Macon Peaches.
She contacted the Braves to see if they had an opening for a secretary. She interviewed with Dick Cecil, the team’s general manager, who hired her to work with the director of a new youth summer camp in 1969.
“The only area they had for an office was in the tunnel at Atlanta Stadium, where everything goes on that people don’t see … the ground crew, maintenance, deliveries,’’ Carla said. “The Braves clubhouse was in the tunnel. During the offseason, the main door was locked, so everybody had to come through my office to get to the clubhouse. That’s where I met Henry.
“When he hit his 600th home run (in 1971), people started to recognize that this guy could break Babe Ruth’s record. He kept asking me if I would help him with his letters and appointments. He started giving me so much work I told him I was having a hard time keeping up with the camp and doing his correspondence. He said, ‘I can fix that,’ and he wrote me into his contract.’’
And, with that, Aaron became the first professional baseball player to have a private secretary.
“I was not paid by Henry. I still was an employee of the Braves,’’ Carla said. “But I was the first to work for just one player. Now, players have agents, managers and personal assistants. And they don’t call them secretaries anymore.’’
Eventually, the volume of mail was more than one person could handle, so the Braves assigned others to help with those duties. Two months after he broke the record in April 1974, Aaron received a plaque from the U.S. Postmaster General. It proclaimed him America’s No. 1 in home runs and fan mail.
Unfortunately, not all of it was fan mail.
“Yes, he did receive mail no one would want to read,’’ she said. “It was a small percentage, but it was still there … and it was disturbing. Some of it frightened him, along with the Braves, because they were responsible for his safety. He hired an Atlanta detective, who never left his side.’’
She also kept up with Aaron’s appointments. She will never forget the morning he overslept when was scheduled to appear live on WSB-TV’s “Today in Georgia.’’ Billye Jewel Suber, the first black woman to co-host a daily talk show in the Southeast, was not happy with the no-show … even if he was a famous sports figure.
“He had never met her. He called to apologize, and she told him it would not happen again because she was a going to pick him up the next week,’’ Carla said. “She did, and the rest is history.’’
At the time, Aaron was divorced with four children. He and Billye married in 1973.
“She knew nothing about baseball, so I would sit with her at every game and explain it to her,’’ Carla said.
Carla followed Aaron to Milwaukee when he was traded to the Brewers. She later went back to New York, then returned to Atlanta. She later lived in Westport, Connecticut, and now resides in Boca Raton, Florida.
Over the years, she and Aaron remained close, like family. Aaron attended her wedding and spoke at her daughter Jenn’s wedding.
Carla was included in the limited guest list for Tuesday’s memorial service at Truist Park in Atlanta and attended the private funeral services on Wednesday at Friendship Baptist.
“He was an important person in my life,’’ she said. “I didn’t look at him as a baseball superstar. I was in my early 20s when I started working for him. Our personalities clicked. We had respect for each other. He showed kindness to everyone. He never thought he was better than the next person. He was a humanitarian who gave to everyone, especially children and underprivileged people.
“I wish more people today could be like him. I think he was bigger in life now than he was when he was a ballplayer. He was one of a kind, a gift to this country. He certainly will be missed.’’
Ed Grisamore teaches journalism at Stratford Academy in Macon. His column appears on Sundays in The Telegraph.
