The women of summer

WASILLA — While coping with the loss of one family member, Dave Robinson found his second family.

Soon after his father died in 1983, Robinson — co-owner of Robinson Millwork — was approached by a group of women in search of a sponsor for their recreational softball team.

“It was a bit of a division for us,” Robinson said. “The girls came up to me and asked me if I wanted to do it. And the rest is history.”

Now 25 years later, Robinson is still sponsoring that women’s softball squad in the Mat-Su Softball Association, and many of the women who were on that first Robinson Millwork team way back in 1983, are still hitting the softball diamond every week for a summer’s worth of fun.

Last week during their final set of games of the summer, the Robinson Millwork squad celebrated 25 years of softball and 25 years of support from Robinson and his business. The 14 players on the squad donned 14 different jerseys, representing the entire timeline of Robinson Millwork women’s softball.

Brenda Carr, who has been with the Robinson Millwork squad since the beginning, said it was a good opportunity to show Robinson just how much the softball squad appreciates the support.

“We’ve been lucky, very lucky,” Carr said. “A lot of teams might be the same team, but they’ll have different sponsors. It’s quite a commitment financially.”

Carr said there is a $500 cost simply to field a team in the Mat-Su Softball Association. And then there’s the cost of tournaments — about $225 — and uniforms. Robinson Millwork has played in state tournaments and regular-season events through Alaska in the past. One season, the team even made a trip to Hawaii for a tourney.

Robinson Millwork has also sponsored a variety of teams throughout the years.

“We’ve had everything from C league teams, B, co-ed to the beer league guys just looking to have a good time,” Robinson said. “Pretty much who ever wanted to play, we’ve always let them play.”

But the women’s team has been the Robinson Millwork stalwart.

“It ends up that we keep the same core,” Carr’s husband John, who has coached the women’s team for the last 18 years, said. “Couple people leave every year, but a couple more people come on.”

Although there may be a new face or two each time the women’s team takes the field for the first time each summer, the bulk of the squad stays the same every year.

“We’re a pretty cohesive team,” Brenda Carr said. “We stick together.”

And by sticking together, what started out as a summer softball team has turned into a second family.

“It’s a family all year,” Diane Hall, a member of the team since 1991, said. “We stay together all year, whether it’s softball in the summer, or bowling or Bunco in the winter.”

Hall said she’s taken only one summer off, and that was to have a baby. But as soon as possible, Hall was back at the Bumpus Ballfields. And like many of the other mothers on the team, the children followed.

“We raised a lot of babies in our dugout,” Kathy Stanberry, a former member of the Robinson Millwork squad, said.

And now the team is preparing for a second generation of Robinson Millwork players.

“We raised each other’s kids out here, and now we’ve got a couple of them on the team,” Sherry Robinson said.

Sherry Robinson is also proof that the family atmosphere of the Robinson Millwork teams is especially true for Dave Robinson. After dating for 11 years, Sherry and Dave married last year.

Just like the players, Dave Robinson said it’s the camaraderie, friendships and family feeling that make him continue to want to sponsor the softball squad.

“It’s a big social thing. Everybody gets along so well,” Dave Robinson said. “Luckily, we’ve had some good teams. But it’s all about the fun.”

And if he has anything to do with it, Robinson said, the Robinson Millwork team will be a fixture in the Mat-Su Softball Association for a long time to come.

“I would hope so,” he said. “As long as they want to play, I’m going to sponsor them.”