Joe Torre’s Hidden Mission: How a Hall of Famer Champions Kids Facing Family Violence

They’re at schools in New York, Cincinnati, Tahiti and in L.A., at Bellflower Middle/High School and John Adams Middle School, John H. Glenn High and McKinley Elementary School, Palisades Charter High, Santa Monica High, Waite Middle School and Washington Preparatory High.

And they’re open to all, whether you’re a kid experiencing violence or you want to be able to help peers who are.

This past year, the foundation says it reached more than 28,000 students. And since it began, more than 425,000 young people, families, schools, and communities.

These Safe at Home spaces are all named “Margaret’s Place,” in honor of Joe’s mom, who was for years the victim of his father’s violent ire.

“It’s a tough subject to talk about,” Joe Torre said. “But you can’t run away from it.”

He did, though. He’s 85 now, but until he was 54, Torre didn’t reveal that baseball had been his refuge when he was growing up. He didn’t tell anyone that when he was a kid, if he saw his dad’s car in front of his house, Joe would go to a friend’s house and wait until he left for his job as a New York police detective. Joe didn’t share memories like he would later, of seeing his big sister, armed with a knife, standing between their mother and their father, who was going for his pistol.