Inducted: 2013
Location: Philadephia, Pennysylvania, United States
For five decades, William "Bill" Steerman has been one of the principal leaders of the American Jewish sports community, beginning in 1964, when he first served as a national Vice President of the United States Committee Sports For Israel. He continued in that position through the 1993 summer Maccabiah Games.
With USCSFI and its successor, Maccabi USA, he took on such responsibilities as co-chair of the 7th (1965) Maccabiah Games Soccer Committee, and assistant coach of the 1965 Maccabiah U.S. Soccer team. He was Chef de Mission of the 1973 U.S. Pan American Maccabi Team to Mexico–where he was awarded the Jacobo Pimstein Maccabi Spirit Trophy–and 1977 Chef de Mission for the U.S. Pan Am Maccabi Team to Brazil.
Bill Steerman was co-chairman of the 1989 U.S. "pre-camp Jewish heritage" project for Maccabiah athletes, and chaired the Housing & Transportation and Security committees of various Maccabiot.
He was an American delegate to the International Maccabiah Organizing Committee (IMC) for four decades, and U.S. delegate to the 35th Zionist Congress in Jerusalem in 2006.
Steerman was a member of the Temple University men's varsity soccer team that won 1952, 1953 and 1954 NCAA National Championships, and was inducted into the Temple University Athletic Hall of Fame in 2009.
The former assistant attorney general for the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania (1960-1964) has served on the Board of Directors of the Aharon Netanel Maccabiah Village in Ramat Gan; the Board of Directors of the International Jewish Sports Hall of Fame; and is co-founder and an elected member of the Philadelphia Jewish Sports Hall of Fame.
The Lifetime Achievement
Award is presented annually, honoring those individuals
who have made significant contributions to the State of Israel and society
through sports.
Of Blessed Memory
