Chuck Van Avery was a man for all occasions. He might sell you a car in the morning, talk his way to your dinner table that night, or from his seat along the third-base line razz the manager so unmercifully that he came into the stands after him.

He loved sports, all of them, enough so that he became a master at talking his way into sold- out venues for athletic events, or just about any other activity he found alluring.

“I used to tell people that I didn’t know Canterbury Downs had a front door,’’ said his daughter, Vickie Vars. “We always came in through the kitchen.’’

Shortly before the first Leonard fight with Roberto Duran in Canada, Van Avery placed a call to his good friend, Pioneer Press columnist Don Riley, who was there to cover the match.

“The place is sold out, and security is fifteen deep. Don’t even bother coming up,’’ Riley told him.

Riley arrived at his press seat the night of the fight and waving to him from the second row was none other than the buddy he had advised to stay home.

Boxing fans knew Van Avery as the man with the microphone, at the Prom Ballroom in St. Paul or Met Sports Center in Bloomington, the ring announcer for boxing at various locations throughout the Twin Cities.

Van Avery entertained a crowd during interludes between bouts, or simply for the sure fun of it. He would frequently introduce personalities who were not within 1,000 miles of them.

“Sugar Ray Leonard, you have a phone call.
It sounds a lot like Marvin Hagler,’’ he once said. Or, “Muhammad Ali, call your answering service.’’

Heads automatically turned this way or that, from ringside to the seats in the balcony.

He would frequently introduce a fighter making his professional debut with hopeful

exaggeration. “In this corner,’’ he would say, “ fighting out of St. Paul, Joe So-and-So, a contender for world middleweight honors.’’ The guy hadn’t thrown a professional punch yet, and VanAvery had him a breath away from touching gloves with the world champion.

Boxing and baseball were his passions, but Van Avery loved horse racing, too. When not accompanied by one of his children, he would arrive at the racetrack in a white suit and Panama hat, looking for all the world as if he were at the races somewhere in the Caribbean, or perhaps on a night out during the mid 1950s in Havana. With him on many of those visits to Canterbury was Jerry Flanagan, youngest brother to Hall of Fame fighters Del and Glen.

On one occasion, Van Avery placed a call to the Canterbury press-box with a message for an acquaintance working there. “Find Flanagan,’’ he said. “I’m in the hospital. I’ve had a heart attack. Tell him I can’t make it tonight.’’

As a boy, Je Vars, Vickie’s son, accompanied his grandfather to Vikings’ games at Met Stadium. They strolled the sidelines, not far from the team bench, taking in the action. On one occasion, his mother recalls, Je pointed to the stands and said, “padaddy, sometime can we sit up there, with all of those other people ?’’

“We always got into things, especially if it was sold out,’’ Vicki added. “My mom just tolerated it. She would simply shake her head.’’

Vickie was 10 or 12 at the time when she was put in charge of scoring the Friday night fights on television. “Dad would get home too late from work (at Midway Ford, where he was employed most of his adult life) and wanted to know what happened. I became pretty good at scoring fights. And he would always bring me a sundae from Porky’s on University Avenue.’’

Van Avery would often leave home on his way to the apple orchard. “But he never came home with any apples,’’ Vickie said. The “apple orchard” she later learned was code for her father’s bookie.

Van Avery’s daughter Luanne recalls some of her father’s friends putting him on a plane for a game in Texas specifically to heckle Billy Martin. “Martin couldn’t stand him,’’ she recalled. Years earlier, Gene Mauch, then managing the Minneapolis Millers, had come into the stands after Van Avery.

Je was 13 when he first attended a boxing card with his grandfather, at the Prom Ballroom. The main event that night was a bout between Gary Holmgren and Brian Brunette.

“I remember the preparation he always put in before a fight,’’ Je said. “He had a legal pad with all sorts of notes. He would lay it out on the kitchen table and study, look over every- thing he was going to say.’’

Je also recalls that his grandfather announced a ght in Canada, featuring welterweight champion Thomas Hearns. “And, of course,
the Larry Holmes fight against Scott LeDoux at Met Sports Center,’’ he said. Je convinced his grandfather to try announcing at professional wrestling matches. He gave it a brief go, but boxing was his sport.

Some of his grandfather’s tricks of the trade were unforgettable. “He had a coroner’s badge he used to get a parking place at Met Sports Center,’’ Je said. “And he had a (horse) owners badge at Canterbury.’’

Van Avery had a serious side. He was a recovering alcoholic and worked tirelessly to help others struggling with addiction. “He never gave up on anyone, Luanne said. “He would keep trying over and over again.’’

For boxing fans, it was his resonant voice they remember best, as it carried throughout the arena. He was a natural, out-talking everyone. His voice carried mellifluously over the loud speakers. “In this corner, weighing 147 pounds, the next welterweight champion of the world, ghting for the rst time, from West St. Paul....’’

And in this corner, the greatest announcer in the history of the world and now of a member of the Minnesota Boxing Hall of Fame - Chuck VanAvery.