Harry Tholen served as a teacher, coach and administrator at the junior college level for 43 years. Having coached teams at Mayfair (Ill.) City College, Sinclair (Ohio) Community College and Santa Fe (Fla.) College, his career record of 782-538 (.592) includes five conference championships, eight regional appearances, two regional runners-up, one regional and district championship and one JUCO World Series appearance.
Additional honors for Tholen include being named the 1980 Indiana-Ohio Junior College Coach of the Year, 1985 Florida State and Southeast District Coach of the Year and 1992 Mid-Florida Conference Coach of the Year.
In 1999, Tholen was inducted into the NJCAA Baseball Coaches Hall of Fame, and in 2004, he was inducted into the Florida Community Colleges Activities Association Hall of Fame in recognition of outstanding contributions and service to its activities and member institutions.
Tholen was actively in the NJCAA for 38 years. He served in a variety of roles, serving on the NJCAA Rules and Constitution Committees and later being elected to serve as the association's Secretary and Vice-President. Subsequently, he was elected twice to serve as President of the NJCAA from 1999-2005. In addition, Tholen served on the ABCA's Executive Committee from 2000-05 and on the ABCA Board of Directors from 2003-05.
Tholen was also awarded international opportunities to serve during his career, being named to the US Baseball Federation Clinic Staff, which held clinics for youth and Italian Professional Baseball in Italy during the summer of 1991. The city of Rimini, Italy invited Harry back in the summers of 1992 and 1993 to work their youth camps. He was also an assistant coach on the 1996 NJCAA All-Star Team that competed in Japan. He would return to Japan again in 2000 as Chief Administrator. In 2004, Tholen again served as an administrator for the NJCAA All-Star Team that competed in Beijing, China.
