This Hoosier worthy of distinction

By TIM SHELLBERG
Times Correspondent | Saturday, September 13, 2008 

Valparaiso resident and recent Distinguished Hoosier Award recipient Ted Erceg was presented with an enviable dilemma upon being honored by Gov. Mitch Daniels.

"I haven't put it up yet because my wife is looking for a special frame," he said. "The certificate is quite large. Certificates are usually 8 inches by 11 inches, which you can easily frame. This one's going to have to be in a special frame.

Reared in Gary, Erceg, 78, is a graduate from Horace Mann High School and a Korean War veteran. Married to his wife, Donna, for 54 years, Erceg worked for more than four decades as a pharmaceutical sales representative, primarily for the national-based Cardinal Health.

Erceg has also spent decades involved at St. Sava Serbian Orthodox Church in Merrillville. Over the years, he has served as the church's president, vice president, secretary and treasurer, and spent more than a decade the chairman of St. Sava's annual Serb Fest.

In 1996, he published "With Pious Gravity," which chronicled area Serbian Americans' trials and tribulations during and after World War I as soldiers fighting in the Serbian army. His father, Mike, was one of more than 450 area Serbian natives who fought for their homeland; by Erceg's estimates, less than 250 returned home after the war.

More than a decade after it was published, Erceg remains astounded at the lives "Gravity" has touched.

"One lady, a doctor from Washington state, bought a book and sent a copy to Serbia to her nephew, who was getting married," he recalled. "The girl he married had an uncle who was one of the boys from Gary. These little tidbits just really put it together for me really well."

For his contributions to the church and to the community, Erceg's longtime friend, Schererville's Milan Opacich, saw it fit that he be recognized on a statewide level. Opacich petitioned the governor's office earlier this year, and Erceg received his award at St. Sava on Aug. 3.

"There's hundreds of awards that the governor can send out; the distinguished teacher award, the distinguished policeman's award, the distinguished fireman's award, and he sends out hundreds of these awards because there are hundreds of people out there doing good work," Erceg said. "But it's the Distinguished Hoosier Award is separate from all the others. It's very special."

Erceg is going to have to make room at home when it comes time to hang his certificate; three years ago, he was awarded a cross of St. Sava, one of the highest honors given by the Orthodox Church.

Although Erceg has been retired for more than a half a decade, he's hardly resting on his laurels; along with remaining active at St. Sava, he is an assistant to five instructors with the athletic department at Valparaiso High School.

Erceg can also be found regularly sitting in the campus' bleachers at the school's sporting events throughout the year. He also dotes upon his three daughters, six grandchildren and two great-grandchildren, and is looking forward to his third great grandchild on the way.

"I have to be out every day working and doing something productive," he said.

"I don't play golf."