By Rebecca Goodman
The Cincinnati Enquirer

COVEDALE - Ernest "Moon" Mauer was a star at Newport High School during the early 1930s.

Not only did he bat .341 for the baseball team, he contributed to the football team's state championship. His picture in the 1935 Newportian - in which he sported a shock of wavy hair and a bowtie - shows why his classmates voted him most handsome.

Mr. Mauer, a World War II veteran and member of the Northern Kentucky Sports Hall of Fame, died March 14 at Good Samaritan Hospital from complications after surgery. The Covedale resident was 88.

A Newport native, he was in high school when his family moved to Walnut Hills. Rather than let his team down, he hitchhiked - or walked if rides were not forthcoming - to Newport High instead of changing schools.

Xavier University and Wittenberg College both offered him full sports scholarships, but he bowed to family pressure and enlisted in the Marines instead.

A sharpshooter, Mr. Mauer was selected to be part of the color guard for Franklin Delano Roosevelt. He served in China, Japan, Guam, Hawaii, San Diego and New York from 1936 until he received an honorable discharge with an excellent character rating in 1940.

He was called to active duty again in 1943 and served until returning home for good on Christmas Day in 1945.

Mr. Mauer became a truck driver for Brinks Inc., retiring 36 years later as office manager.

In 1950 he moved his family to Seibel Lane in Covedale where, for many years, he organized an annual block party. At one such party during the 1980s, then-Cincinnati Mayor Ken Blackwell showed up to proclaim him mayor of Seibel Lane.

Mr. Mauer was a member of St. John's Westminster Union Churchserving as the church's representative to the Dan Beard Council of the Boy Scouts of America.

His high school yearbook lists gardening as a hobby. It would remain his passion for the rest of his life, and his biggest source of pride in his later years.

"He was never happier than when he was outside in his garden," said his daughter, Janis Lee Mauer Murphy of Anderson Township.

He specialized in dahlias and roses and was "most proud that he turned his hobby into growing all the flowers for the church."

Mr. Mauer was preceded in death by his wife, Jeanne Moebus Mauer, in 2002.

In addition to his daughter, survivors include two sons, Charles Ray Mauer of Taylor Mill and Jon Ernest Mauer of Crestview Hills, seven grandchildren and three great-grandchildren.

A memorial service is 2 p.m. Saturday at St. John's Westminster Union Church, 1085 Neeb Road in Delhi Township, followed by a reception. A private burial will be later at Spring Grove Cemetery.

Memorials: St. John Westminster Union Church, 1085 Neeb Road, Cincinnati, OH 45233 or Hospice of Cincinnati, Box 710784, Cincinnati, OH 45271-0784.