Memory of Miners matriarch to be honored

PALMER — During the final summer of her life, Nellie Zaborac measured her time in trips to Hermon Brothers Field.

Wife of a former Mat-Su Miners general manager, the late Stan Zaborac, Nellie spent more than 30 years making those trips to the home of the Valley’s Alaska Baseball League team.

“A lot of her last months was just trying to make it through ball season,” Zaborac’s daughter, Mickie Irvine, said recently.

Zaborac was diagnosed with esophageal cancer in February of 2013. Despite the diagnosis and the health issues that followed, Zaborac was intent on seeing her team play at the ballpark.

“All she kept saying is she wanted to make it through the ball season. It meant a lot to her,” Zaborac’s daughter Roxeanna said. “She went through hell to get to those games, stay for those games. But it meant so much to be there with the people she loved, and to watch the team that she and dad loved working with for so many years.”

Seen by many as the matriarch of the Miners, Nellie Zaborac died Jan. 4 at Mat-Su Regional Medical Center in Palmer. A celebration of her life is slated for 1 p.m., Sunday at the Palmer Elks Lodge.

Stan and Nellie Zaborac worked side-by-side to keep the Miners organization alive from the point Stan took the job as team general manager in 1980 until he died in 1999. But even after Stan’s death, Nellie Zaborac remained a staple at Hermon Brothers, and the team’s biggest fan.

“She wanted to carry on the tradition dad had established,” Roxeanna said. “It meant so much to her, being with the Miners, even if it was just her presence and cheering for her team.”

For many years, Nellie was the person in the Hermon Brothers beer shack. But she wasn’t there to just serve, Mickie Irvine said.

“She was getting all of the beer. She didn’t have it delivered. She’d get it, stock the coolers,” Irvine said.

It was a small piece of the Zaborac’s full body of work with the team. The family’s dedication to the team stretched far and wide. In 1997, the Miners earned a chance to compete in the National Baseball Congress World Series in Wichita, Kansas. The Zaboracs mortgaged their family home to send the team to Wichita, and the Miners returned with the organization’s second World Series title.

Mickie Irvine said her parents loved sports, loved baseball. There weren’t professional teams they rooted for.

“The just liked a good game,” Irvine said.

And their team was the Miners.

The connection with baseball started with the Palmer Little League.

“I can remember when we were little. Dad used to umpire and coach Little League. Mom ran the snack shack. That’s where everything started, Little League,” Roxeanna Zaborac said. “They were cheering for them, the same way they cheered for the Miners.”

Community was always a focal point for their parents, both Roxeanna and Mickie said.

“She immersed herself in whatever interested him,” Roxeanna said of her parents. “Everything he did became a passion with her. Everything they did was geared toward giving back to the community. It was the best example they gave us as kids.”

Mickie said Nellie was proud to work alongside Stan in all their endeavors.

“Everything she did had something to do with what he did,” Mickie said. “He’d cook at the senior center, she’d waitress. He’d cook at the Elks, she’d waitress. He was over with the Miners, she was over with the Miners.”

Earlier this season, the Mat-Su Miners, Rep. Bill Stoltze and Rep. Shelley Hughes presented the Zaborac family with a legislative memoriam sponsored by Stoltze.

“It meant a lot,” Mickie Irvine said of the recognition. “Of course we thought she was special. We knew what she’d done, what they’d put into it. Other people recognizing, too, that meant a lot to us.”

Roxeanna said her family was very thankful for the recognition, but a piece of her wished that her mother was there to experience it.

“I was exceedingly proud, very honored for her,” Roxeanna said. “A sad thing, I wished it happened when she was alive. It would have meant so much to her. She always kind of lived in dad’s shadow. He was such a big personality, and did so much. I think that being recognized would have meant so much to her.”

Mat-Su general manager Pete Christopher and his wife Denise Christopher said it was important to recognize the memory of Nellie Zaborac.

“Pete and I are big history people, history of the game, history of the Miners. The Zaboracs are a big part of that,” Denise Christopher said.

Contact Mat-Su Valley Frontiersman sports editor at sports@frontiersman.com.