Sharing The Legacy Of Pierotti’s Clowns With Lori Thompson’s Sports Lit Students At Los Alamos High School

Submitted by Carol A. Clark
on April 14, 2025
- 1:42 pm

From left, Los Alamos Historical Society staff Rachel Clay and Stephanie Yeamans with LAHS Sports Lit Teacher Lori Thompson during an April 1 visit to her classroom. CourtesyLAPS

LAHS Teacher Lori Thompson discusses the museum label exercise with a student during a visit April 1 from Los Alamos Historical Society staff. CourtesyLAPS

By STEPHANIE YEAMANS
Los Alamos Historical Society

At the invitation of Los Alamos High School (LAHS) teacher Lori Thompson, Los Alamos Historical Society Educator Rachel Clay and I, the Museum/Collections Specialist, visited Lori ’s Sports Lit classes on April 1 to present the history of the Pierotti’s Clowns.

We delivered the presentation to three classes, which included a slide show detailing the team’s development, a list of players, their antics on the field, and specifics about Lou Pierotti and Bun Ryan.

The presentation also highlighted the lasting legacy of the Clowns.

At the Los Alamos Historical Society, our goal is to engage our audience with Los Alamos history and hopefully teach them something new about their community. We brought the story of the Clowns to life for the students by showing a video from the Los Alamos Historical Society Archives and Collections, filmed by Anthony Porto in 1957. The video allowed students to witness the antics that made the Clowns famous.

The students participated in an exercise where they wrote labels for artifacts and photographs that may be displayed in the Los Alamos History Museum or in a temporary exhibit at the Los Alamos County Municipal Building. This provided a chance for the new generation to connect with and learn about community history.

Many students were already familiar with the Pierotti’s Clowns memorial in front of the Mesa Public Library. The presentation helped link the past to the present, demonstrating the Clowns’ impact on Los Alamos through the memorial, the renaming of a North Mesa field to Bun Ryan Field, and the Lou and Lee Pierotti Memorial Scholarship, which the Kiwanis Club of Los Alamos still offers today.

The Pierotti’s Clowns, a five-man fast-pitch softball team, played against traditional nine-man teams for charity. They entertained the Los Alamos community and beyond from the 1950s to the 1970s, even playing reunion games in the 1980s and 1990s.

Watching the Clowns play was a family event, and it helped unite Los Alamos during the Cold War years. Many residents who lived here during that time feel nostalgic when they talk about the Clowns. If you haven’t met someone who remembers them, visit the Bethe House at the Los Alamos History Museum campus to learn more about these men and their impact on the community.

The Los Alamos Historical Society is excited to help teach students about history in Los Alamos Public Schools. Teachers can reach out to Rachel Clay at educator@losalamoshistory.org to schedule a visit.

We welcome any opportunity to share the history of Los Alamos. In this case, Lori Thompson specifically requested a presentation about the Clowns, but we are happy to talk about any aspect of Los Alamos history, from broad eras to specific events.

Our history includes the following eras: