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ORAL HISTORY INTERVIEW
BUD DANIELS REGARDING AUDREY HAINE DANIELS
Women in Baseball
Born:
Resides:
Interviewed by: Frank Boring, GVSU Veterans History Project, August 5, 2010, Detroit,
MI at the All American Girls Professional Baseball League reunion.
Transcribed by: Joan Raymer, May 12, 2011
Interviewer: “Lets begin with your full name and where and when were you born?”
My first name is Austin, but I’m Bud, Bud Daniels and I was born in Winnipeg like
Audrey—grew up there. I spent the whole early part of my life in Winnipeg, even up
through the time and all the years that Audrey was playing baseball. You asked
interesting questions about how she got—she’s extremely modest, extremely so
because—we lived on the same street and in the same block. She lived at 729 College
and I lived at 628, but as kids, we just grew up together and sports were a common
interest. I played hockey and she played baseball, so we had a lot of—sports was our
common ground. 30:26 She first started out playing with the St. Anthony Brown Birds
and it was her first organized baseball and I saw her from starting there and, of course,
she went to the St. Fidel Tigerettes. She was in the senior women’s league in Winnipeg
at sixteen and she was playing with these women that were probably in their mid
twenties. They were the prime seniors fast pitch softball players in Winnipeg, but she
was just sixteen when she tried out with the St. Fidel Tigerettes in 1943. 31:03 She
wound up pitching for the Tigerettes and they won the seniors women’s championship
that year. Now, they played seven inning games, double headers twice a week, I think,
these seven inning double headers. She said she had her picture in the paper a lot and she
did and there are many games where she had nineteen, twenty or twenty-one strike outs
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�in a seven inning game, which was just incredible, and that’s how she got picked up by
the league. In the year they won the championship, 1943, was the best of seven
championships and she pitched all seven games and won four and lost three and they
were all extremely close games. But, it was from that year she had with The St. Fidel
Tigerettes, which was the senior women’s fast pitch league that the scouts saw her. It
wasn’t just that she knew Dolly Hunter, the scouts had actually seen her pitch and that’s
really how she got rolling into the pros. 32:16
Interviewer: “This is probably a tough question, but when did it turn from
neighbor, friend to “I think I want to marry that woman”?”
Gosh, it was a slow process because it started out that I would never miss one of her
games in 1942 when she played with the Brown Birds, then 1943 before she went away,
but we still we were a pair through 1944, I mean I didn’t date any other girls, I wasn’t
interested, but we were just generally interested in each other and grew that way, grew
that way. 33:02 I never got to see then play until 1948, I never saw her play. I man, I
couldn’t afford—I was in the engineering business in Winnipeg, I was serving in an
apprenticeship, so I couldn’t get away, but that last year, we were getting married in
November of 1948, and July of 1948 I went down to see them play and I was aghast at
the baseball. I remember her—all the great games she had as a softball pitcher, this
wasn’t softball, this was hardball let me tell you, and they really played—I couldn’t
believe the level. I use to go to see the northern league hardball, as we called it, northern
league baseball up there, professional ball, and those women played every bit as good as
those northern league players. I was amazed at how good they were. It was really an
awakening to me because I followed the papers and I would send the clips of different
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�games, but it’s not like being there and seeing it. 34:09 When you see it you really have
to believe it. I just saw some outstanding plays and what not. We also had a very good
friend, a lifetime friend that we had—she played in the league and Audrey referred to her
not by that, but it was Dottie Key, Dottie Ferguson, and they stood up for us when we got
married, we stood up for them and you were talking about—did you have any batter that
was, you know, but she didn’t say anything about Dottie, but Dottie, she was her very
best friend, our best friend. When Audrey pitched for Peoria against Rockford, Dottie
was one—she would make Audrey pitch to her and she would lean way over the plate
purposely to get hit because she was one of the top base stealers in the league. 35:02 So,
that’s how—she would purposely tell us that she was going to get on base. Audrey was
her best friend, but she would lean way over the plate to get hit, because she couldn’t get
a hit on her, but she would get hit and she’d get on base and once she got on there was a
pretty good chance she was going to steal it. 1948 was the first year I saw them play and
it was just an incredible experience. I guess I’m one of the few that’s still around that
actually saw these women play, but they were outstanding.
Interviewer: “When did you start carrying the picture in the wallet? When did
that start?”
Actually I got that and I started carrying that the year we got married. 1948, the summer
of 1948, when I was down there, and this was a team picture, just of herself, they took
individual pictures of the players and I have this picture of her and this picture has been
in my wallet for sixty-two years, and that’s the condition of it. 36:30 Every day for
sixty-two years, that’s the picture. That’s gone through about eight or ten wallets, but I
think just the quality of that picture from 1948 is outstanding.
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�Interviewer: “Beautiful, at the last reunion you were off by yourself and we just got
talking and that’s when you pulled that out and I said I had to get you on camera
with that picture and now we’ve got it, which is great, which is great. Let me ask
you the same question I asked Audrey. What do you make of all this “whoop la la”
about all of this?” 37:18
Well you know, when you went back earlier they didn’t talk about it. Our kids never
knew anything about it, never talked about it and it was just like it never even existed.
But, in 1982 when they had their first reunion in Chicago that opened the whole thing
wide open. From there on, each reunion, there became more interest in this talk about the
book or the movie or something else and it’s absolutely taken off. Now, today, I’ll bet
you when we get home there are going to be at least four or five pieces of mail requesting
autographs. There is not a week that goes by that she doesn’t get mail-requesting
autographs, information about somebody who’s doing an essay for school, it’s endless.
38:17 I said it’s hard to believe, I know a couple of months ago I mailed twenty-one
pieces of mail and I said, “How can this be after all these years?” But, that’s what
happens—the media—through the movie, there’s not—I haven’t run across anybody who
hasn’t seen this movie. Like I said, we go to a restaurant or something—we know
different ones that know her and they come and see her and talk about it and then they
bring other waitresses over to meet this woman, it just goes on and on and it’s wonderful.
39:06 I said to Audrey many times, I said, “when you have the opportunity to talk to
somebody you should tell them about this, don’t keep it a secret. You’re not bragging or
anything, you’re sharing a wonderful moment”. I said, “that’s what you have to do, you
have to allow other people access to all this”, so she does now and it’s wonderful. I said,
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�“share it, share it, don’t take it with you, share it and let as many people as possible enjoy
it”.
Interviewer: “That’s wonderful and thank you so much.”
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�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
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All-American Girls Professional Baseball League Interviews
Creator
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Grand Valley State University. History Department
Description
An account of the resource
The All-American Girls Professional Baseball League was started by Philip Wrigley, owner of the Chicago Cubs, during World War II to fill the void left by the departure of most of the best male baseball players for military service. Players were recruited from across the country, and the league was successful enough to be able to continue on after the war. The league had teams based in Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana and Michigan, and operated between 1943 and 1954. The 1954 season ended with only the Fort Wayne, South Bend, Grand Rapids, Kalamazoo, and Rockford teams remaining. The League gave over 600 women athletes the opportunity to play professional baseball. Many of the players went on to successful careers, and the league itself provided an important precedent for later efforts to promote women's sports.
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/484">All-American Girls Professional Baseball League Collection, (RHC-58)</a>
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Subject
The topic of the resource
Sports for women
World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American
All-American Girls Professional Baseball League--Personal narratives
Oral history
Baseball players--Minnesota
Baseball players--Indiana
Baseball players--Wisconsin
Baseball players--Michigan
Baseball players--Illinois
Baseball for women--United States
Publisher
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Grand Valley State University Libraries, Special Collections and University Archives, 1 Campus Drive, Allendale, MI, 49401
Identifier
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RHC-58
Format
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video/mp4
application/pdf
Type
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Moving Image
Text
Language
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eng
Date
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2017-10-02
Contributor
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Smither, James
Boring, Frank
Relation
A related resource
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Oral History
A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge.
Dublin Core
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RHC-58_BDaniels
Title
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Daniels, Bud (Interview transcript and video), 2010
Creator
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Daniels, Bud
Description
An account of the resource
Bud Daniels grew up in Winnipeg, Manitoba, just down the street from his future wife, Audrey Haine. Both were active in sports, and when Audrey played organized softball while they were teenagers, he would attend every game. They stayed in touch after she was recruited into the AAGPBL, and married in 1948. During this time Audrey would play for the Minneapolis Millerettes, Fort Wayne Daisies, Grand Rapids Chicks, Peoria Redwings, and Rockford Peaches. In addition to telling his side of their story, he discusses both the quality of play he saw, and the popularity of the league and their players over the past twenty years.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Boring, Frank (Interviewer)
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives
Subject
The topic of the resource
Oral history
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Video recordings
All-American Girls Professional Baseball League--Personal narratives
Baseball for women--United States
Baseball
Sports for women
World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Moving Image
Text
Relation
A related resource
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2010-08-05
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/484">All-American Girls Professional Baseball League Collection, (RHC-55)</a>
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
application/pdf
video/mp4
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https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/bd0f453c3a40866bec3cf03c51eeafff.m4v
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PDF Text
Text
ORAL HISTORY INTERVIEW
NORMA DEARFIELD, Second Base
Women in Baseball
Born: 1928 in McKeesport, Pennsylvania
Resides: White Oak, Pennsylvania
Interviewed by: James Smither, PhD, GVSU Veterans History Project, August 7, 2010,
Detroit, MI at the All American Girls Professional Baseball League reunion.
Transcribed by: Joan Raymer, October 13, 2010
Interviewer: “Can you start by giving us a little bit of background on yourself? To
begin with, where and when were you born?”
I was born in McKeesport, Pennsylvania to Mr. And Mrs. James Whitney. There were
five of us in our family and I was the second oldest.
Interviewer: “In what year were you born?”
I was born in 1928.
Interviewer: “What did your family do for a living then?”
Dad worked on the railroad and my mother stayed at home and was a homemaker and
took care of all of us. 1:34
Interviewer: “Now with the railroad, was your father able to keep his job then
during the depression?”
He did keep his job, but he was on what they called the extra board and he went out when
they called him and he was one of his family members that, of the men, that still really
kept their job and worked. They shared with each other, food that they had gotten from
some of the places that gave out certain foods, so they shared with each other and made it
through. 2:08
Interviewer: “How did you get involved in sports?”
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�Well, when I was very young I always had a tennis ball, always, and I was throwing it
into the house or anywhere and catching it. I don’t know, I just liked playing ball and the
Christmas when I was about twelve years old, I asked for a baseball glove and my mother
told me that girls don’t get baseball gloves and I said, “then I don’t want anything for
Christmas, if I can’t have a glove, I don’t want anything”, so needless to say, I did have
this glove and it was the same glove I played--my dad bought me a good glove at the time
which surprised me, but it was the same glove that I still have today ad that I played in
the league with. We didn’t have organized sports at that time in our city, so we just
made up our own teams and played other cities next to us. 3:17 We played each other
and my dad was out coach and I just played until I was probably eighteen or so and after
high school I just got a job and I was working and I saw a little piece in the paper, just a
little tiny article, for tryouts in McKeesport, Pennsylvania for the All American Girls
Professional Baseball League. Well, I never had heard about it, I didn’t know anything
about it, so I called the girls on our team and I asked them, “let’s go out and see what this
is all about”, so when we got there seventy-five to a hundred girls were there from Ohio,
West Virginia and different places, so we got out there and we had to bat, field, infield,
outfield, slide into base, just everything they wanted us to do we had to do, so when it
was over they just said that they would send us a letter saying whether we made it or not.
4:30 I had gotten a letter to South Bend, myself and another girl, so then my dad and my
mother knew nothing about this league and they didn’t know if they wanted me to go by
myself, so my dad said, “I’ll go with you and I’ll stay for a few days to find out what this
is all about”. So, being that he worked on a railroad we had a pass and off we went to
Chicago to go on the train. He had a sister that lived in Gary, Indiana, so he stayed with
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�her you know, and would come back where we were on the field and stayed with me for
three days and talked with whoever he had to talk with and felt comfortable leaving.
5:20 Then I had to tryout there. Davie Bancroft was the one that was doing it the day
that I was trying out, was coaching us. I can remember we had to go out on a field at the
position that we played and I had never had a baseball hit to me, I had softballs and the
field was shorter and the balls were bigger, so the first time I fielded the ball, I did field it
and I turned my head a little and he pointed the bat at me and said, “if you want to play in
this league you can break your nose or knock your teeth out, but don’t turn your head”.
6:13 Now I’m more nervous and I thought I better do what I know that I can do, so I did,
so then I had to do everything that they expected of us to do you know and then when
that time was over eventually, I was told that I was going to stay and I was put on the
team.
Interviewer: “So when you got to South Bend and you were doing the tryout, were
there a lot of other girls trying out at the same time or just you?”
Oh yeah, there were many of them, I don’t know how many, but there were many of them
all trying out.
Interviewer: “Did you have any sense of where they were from or how far they had
come to do this?”
Not really, at the time I didn’t know them and I really didn’t know anybody, I was just—I
felt so alone, but you make good friends with them real fast and most of them were
from—a lot of them that I was friends with were from the states around here. 7:13
Interviewer: “But basically you were just going on with your life in Pennsylvania,
what kind of a job did you have when you were there?”
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�After school I got a job at the J.C. Murphy Co. warehouse and I worked there just filling
orders for the stores and things.
Interviewer: “The league that you were playing in, was it a women’s league or a
girls league? What was that?”
Back home? It was girls they were all girls.
Interviewer: “Did you have people actually come to watch the games or did you
just go and play?”
Oh yeah, the local people, we had not a lot, but they knew when we were playing and
they gathered around. We went to different cities close to us and played other teams
because we had to organize our own games ahead of time and schedule the women that
played. 8:16 We played from the time I started at sixteen I guess until I was called to go
to this league.
Interviewer: “What year was it that you joined the league?”
1949
Interviewer: “So now you have gotten the call and you tried out. Probably most of
those girls trying out at South Bend didn’t make the team, they had a lot of them.”
A lot of them didn’t I guess.
Interviewer: “Did they tell you right there whether you made the team or not?”
Yes, at the end of the few days that I was there. That’s when they told us if we were
placed or not and everyday we tried out and had to do something different and different
things you know.
Interviewer: “Could you hit as well as field?”
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�I did pretty good, I had a couple triples, but I never had a home run. I was a fast runner
and I could steal bases. I batted second all the time and most of the time if I’d gone on
from hitting I knew I was going to get to second or third. 9:22
Interviewer: “I’m going to go back here. You signed up with the South Bend club
at the start of the season or was the season already going?”
At the start and I left in, I think it was May, and I didn’t come home until September. I
stayed right there the whole time.
Interviewer: “Did they have any kind of spring training before the games started or
did you just start playing games?”
Well, we had some spring training and that’s—I can’t remember what field we tried out
at, but I was over in South Bend for spring training before we started.
Interviewer: “So, they were doing their training just right there. They weren’t off
in some other location that year?”
Right
Interviewer: “When you joined the team that year, were most of the players
veteran players who had been there for a while or did they have a lot of new ones?”
10:16
Most of them were veteran players who had been there over the years, but that was
during spring training and then I was put on the touring team which were all new players.
We toured the country, more or less, to keep baseball alive.
Interviewer: “The league had two touring teams didn’t they and they would travel
around together and play each other?”
Yes, the Chicago Colleens and the Springfield Sallies.
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�Interviewer: “Which one were you on?”
The Chicago Colleens
Interviewer: The Chicago Colleens, all right, they were all basically newer or
younger players who were doing this?”
Some were—we had one or two that were fifteen or sixteen and at that time I was
eighteen, nineteen.
Interviewer: “If it was 1949, probably twenty, twenty one. So, you were a little bit
older then?” 11:19
Older than some of them, but a lot were around my age or even older.
Interviewer: “Do you remember where you went, some of the places or states you
went to?”
We were in like thirty-eight states. We went through the Midwest and out as far as
Texas, Oklahoma, all in through some of the western states, South Carolina and Georgia,
almost all of them. I have little pennants from every state and I had one wall filled with
every city that we played in because we played in several cities in one state when we
would get there. We traveled all night.
Interviewer: “How were you getting around?”
By bus, it was like a school bus and not a very comfortable one, but we would travel
short distances some of the time and sometimes as long as two or three hundred miles to
the next city. 12:21
Interviewer: “All right now, what kind of reception did you get in the towns that
you played in?”
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�Oh, a lot, there were a lot of people and they were very receptive to us. They had a lot—
I’m trying to think, several times we had several thousand people there for the games.
Interviewer: “Are there any particular places you went that stand out in your mind
and you went to a lot?”
Not too many because we really didn’t have time to do a lot of sightseeing or anything
like that, but we had some time during the day, but most of the time it was just play ball,
take the bus to the next town, go to bed because you didn’t sleep good because you
traveled all night and then you had to get to the Laundromat to wash the clothes that you
had. You only had a little small suitcase and you weren’t allowed to take much of
anything. 13:32
Interviewer: “This version of the league, or this part of it, how much of the sort of
rules and regulations on dress or conduct or things like that, how much of that
applied to you?”
About the same as what was in the league. We were not allowed to wear shorts or slacks
on the street. We had to have skirts on. We could change in the bus, just pull them up
and take the shorts off and put a skirt on to go out. When I was in spring training I had to
go to charm school to learn how to sit and conduct yourself sitting, walking, drinking
coffee and things like that. 14:28
Interviewer: “Was this new to you or just new to some of the other girls, having
particular rules like that to follow?
No, pretty much at home we had to “yes ma’am”, “no ma’am”, we didn’t get up from the
table unless we asked to be excused and I still did that with my kids today, so it was easy
to do.
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�Interviewer: “Did they have rules about socializing or anything else like that? If
you were riding around on the bus all the time you didn’t need to worry about it.”
We didn’t have time to—like the girls in the league, they had more time to go out in the
evening, in the daytime rather and socialize, but we didn’t have very much time to
socialize. We were busy just playing ball. Every night we played a game including
Sunday and sometimes two on Sunday. 15:24
Interviewer: “What sort of people did you have in your audience, who would come
to watch these games?”
There were children and all sorts of people that were with them. A couple of servicemen,
you would see them in the crowd, but most of them were just families and people that
wanted to come and watch because they advertised ahead of time, so they knew. They
had our pictures in store windows and different things before we got there. 16:32
Interviewer: “Now, when you came into a town, did they ever do anything for you
or any promotional events or did you have to show up places for different things?”
Not too much, not too much because like I said, we were—by the time we would come in
most of us would try to get an hour or two of sleep because you had to try to sleep on the
bus sitting up on the straight seat. We had some free time that we could walk down the
street and look things a little bit over, but not too much, it was mostly all-Interviewer: “Alright now, you were playing in skirts right?”
Right
Interviewer: “You had these skirts etc. and you were a runner and a base stealer, so
did you have problems with “Strawberries” and all that?”
Yes I did, several times on the side from sliding, stove fingers. 17:30
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�Interviewer: “ You’re playing on whatever playing field is available too, so were
some of them in not so good shape?”
Some of them were not real smooth, but we managed and we played on them.
Interviewer: “Did the group of you traveling together, did you kind of make a good
set of friends there, being together with these women all the time?”
Oh yeah, even though we were two teams, we were all very close and we still are today.
Interviewer: “Did you play the full season?”
Yeah, I played every game except toward the end of the season I got hit in the eye with
an elbow, actually my manager’s elbow, and I had double vision for two weeks, so I
didn’t play. Then I went back on and I played every game, so after that I played, which
resulted in an eye injury later and it stopped my playing ball. 18:37
Interviewer: “How did you get a manager’s elbow in your eye?”
We were—a bunch of us kind of fooling around and it just swung around or something, I
think it was his elbow or something and so that—that’s the only time I didn’t play.
Interviewer: “But then you did not come back for the next season?”
Well, what happened was between the two seasons I went back to work at Murphy
company, at my job, and my sister worked there also, so I was coming home, got off the
bus and was walking down the street to home and I got terrific pain in my eye and I
grabbed it, that same eye that I had—it was like a very sharp pain, so I just pulled my
eyelid down because I thought maybe I got something in my eye and I said, ok,
everything’s ok”, and we went on until I got in the house. Shortly after I thought, “I can’t
see out of this eye”, so I would hold my good eye and I’d look at my sister of my mother
or my dad and I said, “daddy, I can’t see too much out of this eye, and I had a sharp pain
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�in it. I don’t know what’s wrong, but I can’t see very good”. 20:02 The next day he
took me to an eye doctor and he looked in it and said, “there’s something there, but I’m
not sure, I think you need to see a surgeon”, so he took me to an eye surgeon the next day
and he looked in my eye and he said, “you have a detached retina”. I didn’t know what a
detached retina was and I said, “What is that?” He said, “that means you’re going right
from here to the hospital”. I said, “oh no, I can’t” and I was dating my husband at that
time and he played “roller hockey’, so he had a game in Ohio and his birthday was
coming up and this was on a Wednesday that I was at the doctor and I said, “I can’t go,
I’ll come back on Monday”, and he said, “you’ll be operated on Friday, this is very
serious and we’ve got to get this taken care of”, so I was operated on Friday and I laid
thirty three days in a hospital with both eyes bandaged, they had to tell me when to open
my mouth and feed me, I couldn’t move, my bed was flat, my head was hurting, my dad
tried to get a little thin air pillow and they said absolutely not. 21:24 Back then you laid
all that time, so the last day I was ready to come home and the doctor sat on the bed
beside me, at the time I knew I was going to go to south Bend up in the league, so he
said, “your dad tells me that you play baseball?”, and I said, “yeah and I’m excited
because this year I’m going up in the league”, and he said, “I just hate to tell you this, but
you’re not going to be able to play baseball any more”, and I said, “oh yeah, I’m going to,
I have to you know”, and he said, “If you do you’ll have, if it detaches again, little or no
eyesight in that eye”. 22:18 Naturally my parents did not allow me to go and that kind
of ended my baseball career, which was very devastating. I really, really wanted to go
especially up in the lake you know, even though I enjoyed where I was, everything we
did. Then I had to wear those big pin point glasses with the little dot for about two
10
�months after and I was led around like a—my dad had to build a box so my plate would
sit level and I wasn’t allowed to—if I sneezed I had to hold my head. I had a whole list
of do’s and don’ts. So, I guess at that time, so now when I go for new glasses my doctor
said, “Norma, if you had that detached retina today you would be playing ball in two
weeks because they glue it”, so that was the end of my career, but I’ve come to all the
reunions and stayed in touch with all the girls. 23:16
Interviewer: “Did you stay in touch with the girls immediately after you left or did
you connect after the organization formed?”
That’s part of it, I mostly was with the girls that I knew from the two teams, but the more
I came to the reunions I got to know everybody, so we just talk to anybody that comes
past.
Interviewer: “Once you stopped having to wear pin point glasses and all that kind
of thing, did you go get married then or what did you do?”
Shortly after, well no, we dated for a couple of years and after that he and my dad came
out a couple places to see me while we were dating. We played in Springfield, Ohio and
one place in Pennsylvania and I just—yeah, we dated and then after three years of that we
ended up getting married and I had four children and now I have ten grandchildren and
three great grandsons. 24:30
Interviewer: “In this case your husband knew you played ball, and did your family
know that, did your friends know that because a lot of players just went off and
nobody knew they had ever done that?”
Well, I don’t think anybody like in the city or anything like that really knew. My family
knew, in fact when we were in Pennsylvania and Ohio a couple of them came there to see
11
�us play, but it wasn’t until after the movie that kind of—even myself I just went off, got
married, raised kids and I never worked after that and it just went on until I got a letter
one day to come to the film if I wanted to, so I went and I played in the movie. I played
second base at the end of the movie and other than that it was just life after baseball.
25:34
Interviewer: “Aside from getting an elbow in your eye, how do you think that
experience affected you? Did it change you at all or did you take anything with it?”
With what?
Interviewer: “The experience of playing in the league for that year.”
You mean—I’m not understanding.
Interviewer: “Well, basically the experience of having played professional baseball
for a year and going around with those teams and that kind of thing. Do you think
that had any kind of a lasting effect on you and did you learn something from it or
gain something from it that stayed with you?”
Well, you were just—when you were finished playing ball that was just the end of it. It
seemed like—it didn’t do anything after that and like I said, I got married shortly after
and just went on. It was just a lot of friendship that we made and I’ve kept them over the
years and I still keep in close contact with several of them mostly talking on the phone.
26:52
Interviewer: “It got sort of into the seventies and the eighties and you had things
like Title IX coming in and you actually had an effort to recruit girls into organized
sports and this kind of thing, did you pay much attention to that?”
12
�Yes, I coached girls softball and was on the board of directors of the McKeesport Board
Association which then was starting to be organized sports, but I coached girls softball
for several years until—I even had to take the children with me, not when they were little
I didn’t get involved, but when they started getting bigger I got involved in sports and
like I said, I did coach girls softball and then stayed involved for a while in this
organization with them trying to get other fields because they didn’t have a lot for girls,
back in our town it was all boys. 27:56 Where I tried out at our local park in
McKeesport the park had a lot of property there we worked hard trying to—we wanted
to have a whole complex like four fields maybe and concession stands and that and we
got a lot of people to donate equipment and everything, but you know they—it just
wouldn’t go, they just blocked us in different ways. I guess it was going to cost them a
lot of money, the city, but we had a lot of volunteers, but it didn’t work out. 28:43 then
baseball just—you know you got older and kind of—I mean I’m still very, I mean I never
miss a game from the Pirates not seeing them, and I mean I do see several and I’ll watch
them and they will say, “are you still watching them Pittsburgh Pirates?” and I say, “well,
yeah”, it’s the only team we have, so I have to root them on.
29:03
Interviewer: “ I’m afraid I’ve been a Cubs fan all my life, so I know something
about following futility.”
You know what, when my daughter—my son-in law is an oral surgeon and he did his
oral surgery residency down at Charleston South Carolina and I would go down there and
the only two teams I could see was the Cubs or the Atlanta Braves, so I was—I have
13
�relatives in Ohio and Indiana, so I’m kind of like a Cub fan also because that’s what I
watched when I was down there and that’s what they would watch. 29:54
Interviewer: “At least the Pirates have won a few world series in the past century,
so—to think back to the year you spent traveling around with the Colleens, are
there particular people who stand out in your memory? Are there particularly good
friends that you made and spent a lot of time with?”
There are several that I have stayed real close with, Toni Palermo, she was a shortstop, so
she and I had a combination there and there are several that I have kept in contact with at,
Jane Moffet, in fact I was up in New Jersey three weeks ago for—they were honoring her
for her life more or less, before baseball, during baseball and also her eightieth birthday
party, so there were about eight girls up there and they were the ones that were real close
here at reunions. I do, I stay in touch with a lot of them yet. 30:59
Interviewer: “Are there anything that happened, any particular moments in any of
those games that stand out in your mind?”
One game stands out in my memory, we were losing and two were on base and I got a
triple and won the game more or less, so you have memories like that and you kind of
clear the bases, but I wasn’t real big, so I wasn’t strong enough to get some of the home
runs, but I did have a couple triples, but it was mostly singles and doubles and things like
that. 31:42
Interviewer: “Were you a good defensive player?”
Yes, I felt I was
Interviewer: “So, you could turn a double play?”
Yes and Toni was really good at that too.
14
�Interviewer: “She’s a dynamic character, we talked to her last year some. All right,
anything you would like to add to the record here before we close out the
interview?”
No, just that the memories have lasted forever playing ball. Like I said, we lost the part
we weren’t together, but you never forgot those days and the friends even before the
movie we were still friends with some of them and we still are. It’s sad when every year
we’re losing so many of them now, but I still keep pretty active. I go to aerobics four
days a week, I most days for an hour, I don’t know how far I walk, but I walk for about
an hour and I do a lot of volunteer work taking older people to their doctors appointments
and helping kids do thing, so I stay pretty active. 33:05
Interviewer: “That’s pretty impressive and thank you very much for coming and
talking to us.”
Well, I enjoyed it.
:
15
�16
�
Dublin Core
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Title
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All-American Girls Professional Baseball League Interviews
Creator
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Grand Valley State University. History Department
Description
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The All-American Girls Professional Baseball League was started by Philip Wrigley, owner of the Chicago Cubs, during World War II to fill the void left by the departure of most of the best male baseball players for military service. Players were recruited from across the country, and the league was successful enough to be able to continue on after the war. The league had teams based in Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana and Michigan, and operated between 1943 and 1954. The 1954 season ended with only the Fort Wayne, South Bend, Grand Rapids, Kalamazoo, and Rockford teams remaining. The League gave over 600 women athletes the opportunity to play professional baseball. Many of the players went on to successful careers, and the league itself provided an important precedent for later efforts to promote women's sports.
Source
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<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/484">All-American Girls Professional Baseball League Collection, (RHC-58)</a>
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<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Subject
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Sports for women
World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American
All-American Girls Professional Baseball League--Personal narratives
Oral history
Baseball players--Minnesota
Baseball players--Indiana
Baseball players--Wisconsin
Baseball players--Michigan
Baseball players--Illinois
Baseball for women--United States
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Grand Valley State University Libraries, Special Collections and University Archives, 1 Campus Drive, Allendale, MI, 49401
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RHC-58
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video/mp4
application/pdf
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Moving Image
Text
Language
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eng
Date
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2017-10-02
Contributor
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Smither, James
Boring, Frank
Relation
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Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Oral History
A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge.
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RHC-58_NDearfield
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Dearfield, Norma (Interview transcript and video), 2010
Creator
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Dearfield, Norma
Description
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Norma Dearfield was born in McKeesport, Pennsylvania in 1928. She talked her parents into giving her a baseball glove for Christmas when she was twelve, and played on local girls' teams while in high school. She saw an ad in the newspaper for tryouts for the All Americans in the spring of 1949, and played all that summer for the Chicago Colleens on their barnstorming tour. She played second base, batted second and stole a lot of bases. An eye injury at the end of the season ended her professional career, but she later coached girls' softball teams in her home town.
Contributor
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Smither, James (Interviewer)
Publisher
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Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives
Subject
The topic of the resource
Oral history
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Video recordings
All-American Girls Professional Baseball League--Personal narratives
Baseball for women--United States
Baseball
Sports for women
World War, 1939-1945
Baseball players--Illinois
Women
Language
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eng
Rights
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<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Type
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Moving Image
Text
Relation
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Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Date
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2010-08-05
Source
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<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/484">All-American Girls Professional Baseball League Collection, (RHC-55)</a>
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application/pdf
video/mp4
-
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/a1f0d8924cc4ac4b737e6cba28c3dbe0.mp4
aadf31649def986beaca16c9b1f5b0d3
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/e6d13f4c9fa4eedeba1919ed7f9903a7.pdf
6f12354613c0b869974d8ba337e56589
PDF Text
Text
ORAL HISTORY INTERVIEW
JERRE DENOBLE
Women in Baseball
Born: June 11, 1923
Resides:
Interviewed by: James Smither PhD, GVSU Veterans History Project, August 8, 2010,
Detroit, MI at the All American Girls Professional Baseball League reunion.
Transcribed by: Joan Raymer, April 7, 2011
Interviewer: “Now Jerre, can you start by telling us a little bit of background on
yourself? To begin with, where and when were you born?”
I was born in 1923, June 11 in Oakland, California, at 131 Chestnut Street. I even
remember the address.
Interviewer: “What did your family do for a living?”
My dad was a truck driver and my mom was a stay at home mom because in those days
women didn’t have jobs, they stayed home and had babies.
Interviewer: “Did your father keep his job during the depression?”
No, there were three express companies, Mayflower, Bekins and my dad’s was Market
Street Express and they lost business, so he had to go to driving--become a teamster and
drive for other companies.
Interviewer: “But he still had work?”
Oh yeah, we were very fortunate in that respect. We didn’t have money, you know, he
would save tires and cut the rubber and sew it to our shoes, so we could get around, you
know. 16:57
Interviewer: “When did you start playing sports?”
1
�I guess since I was able to walk. My daddy—we had two boys, but he made a tomboy
out of me. My brothers were into music and stuff like that, so I started playing ball from
the time I was a tiny thing I guess. I’d say about ten or somewhere around there.
Interviewer: “Whom were you playing with?”
My Daddy--we had a long driveway and boy, he’d pepper that ball in and I’d—he’d say,
“it’s all right, if you’re going to learn to play ball you got to catch them”.
Interviewer: “When you were playing, did you have a regular baseball or a
softball?”
Well, he had a—I guess it was kind of like a softball.
Interviewer: “Did you have a glove?”
Ah huh, I had a five-finger Ty Cobb and Babe Ruth and it had one web. 18:00
Interviewer: “When did you start to play on teams?”
I was about—we had to lie about my age—I was about fourteen and you’re supposed to
be sixteen and the other girls, they were about ten or eleven years older than myself. I
played for a while with just the amateurs, and then the manager, Ollie Fisher from J.D.
Craig’s, he was a world champ three times in a row, and he picked me up and I started
playing with him and from then on we just kept going—industrial leagues and about four
nights a week is what we played, different teams you know. 18:45
Interviewer: “What position did you play?”
Well, in softball I was playing second base, but when I converted over to hardball, the
girls complained about bruises in their hands, they were a little too hard, I ended up in
left field and it didn’t do too much damage except hit the home plate.
2
�Interviewer: “Ok, now when you were playing softball, how far would you travel?
Did you stay in California?
City to city, Visalia, down south, wherever and whoever, yah
Interviewer: “What kind of audiences did you have?”
Fairly good, and of course most of the out of town ones were like country, and you didn’t
have a big attendance because the population was less you know. When we played the
cities like Alameda or San Francisco, we even played against men down at the Oakland
ballpark. 19:50 We had a great pitcher, her name was Willie Turner, a little blonde
bomber from Stockton or some place like that. We had real good pitchers in those days,
Betty Evans from Portland, Oregon.
Interviewer: “Now, were you playing in the leagues during World War II?”
Yeah doing that and working sixteen-hour shift in the Glass House. We were making
those big floats for the Submarines and stuff like that you know. Between playing ball
and working, we didn’t get much rest.
Interviewer: “I wouldn’t think so.”
Three or four hours sleep a day.
Interviewer: “How much were they paying you?”
At the Glass House?
Interviewer: “Did they pay you for the softball?”
Well, I got hired in to play ball, but I wasn’t tall enough to work there. You had to be
five feet ten and weigh over a hundred pounds, which I wasn’t, so they hired me in to
play ball, but I worked my way in. 20:55 Taught myself, watched the girls pack and
how they flip the bottles and when they realized I could do it they built pallets and then
3
�they started lowering the—and hiring people my height, but we were the first Guinea
Pigs, you might call it, because the men had all those jobs and when the war broke out
they took the men out, so they had to replace them with women and women aren’t as tall
as men, so they had to make all these adjustments you know. We had fourteen
departments down there and I worked twelve of the fourteen, all different jobs.
Interviewer: “Now, did you like working there? Did you enjoy working there?”
Yeah, to a point—it was rough, but I liked almost all the jobs, yeah. 21:47 I spent forty
years there, so—I eventually worked up to a supervisor’s job also. They made me a
supervisor over the teamsters and the warehouse men and that was the toughest thing I
ever did in my life. 22:01 You didn’t boss them, you asked them, but I made a lot of
friends and they’re still my friends. In fact, they’re better friends to me than the women.
Interviewer: “When you were playing softball, did you play on military bases or did
you entertain soldiers?”
Yes, I also coached the women’s WAVES in Alameda.
Interviewer: “Did you play for audiences on the bases?”
No, it was mostly practice and I guess they played out of town because I didn’t travel
with them because I had a job, but when they were stationed in for a month or whatever
because they were stationed in Hawaii and all different places, so it was hard to travel
with them.
Interviewer: “When you were playing with your softball teams, did you ever go
outside of California?” 22:59
No, we stayed within the county, Alameda County mostly.
Interviewer: “How did you wind up with the All American?”
4
�Well, I didn’t know a thing about it, but Dottie—Dorothy Stolze, I called her Dottie, I
grew up with her. She lived about three houses up from me and we played softball on the
same team. How she found out, I don’t know, but she approached me one day and said,
“Jerre, they’re going to have tryouts in San Francisco and they’re going to send a scout
out. Let’s go over and tryout for baseball”, and I said, “I don’t know if I want to”. I had
a job and I had a lot of years and built up seniority that I didn’t want to lose, but she said,
“Let’s give it a try, we made out basics”, so I did, I went over with her and there were
like five hundred gals that were there. 24:03 They hit balls to us and grounders and fly
balls over our shoulder and did about everything they could do, but have us stand on our
heads. They didn’t say nothing to us and about two weeks, I guess, later I got a letter
from Max Carey stating to go get a Passport and my birth certificate, and that we would
be receiving a ticket for a flight, to Havana, Cuba. That’s how we found out we were
going to play ball. When we got to Cuba, we went to the training and it was quite a
conversion. Conversion over from softball-- base lengths, pitching and everything
different, but I liked it and we adjusted, but I was sent to Grand Rapids, Michigan. 24:57
Interviewer: “Lets back up a little bit. Tell me a little bit more about spring
training in Cuba. When you got the invitation to go play in the league, did you
agree right away or did you have to think about it?”
No, I just went to it.
Interviewer: “I guess you told me before we started the interview that you weren’t
sure you wanted to go.”
I was hesitant, but once—if fact I didn’t really want to go and my supervisor he told me,
“Jerre”, he said, “We’ll give you a leave of absence, you won’t lose any time on the job,
5
�we’ll stop your time and then when you come back we’ll start it again”, and I said, “I
don’t know”, and he said, “it’s a chance of a lifetime you’ll probably never ever get
again”, so I went. That’s the reason that I went, because they said they wouldn’t give me
my seniority back, which they did in the end. 25:50
Interviewer: “Now, what was it like to play in Cuba?”
It was fun. They called us Amazons because the girls over there are very, very frail, very
feminine and short. Here we are throwing like sixteen-pound bowling balls and they
throw that little tiny thing, and we’re out there playing ball like mad—they just didn’t
believe it. They would follow us around, oh my goodness. I got pictures you should see,
I mean it was like playing a game. They would sit up there in the bleachers and follow us
outside the gate—it was fun. In fact, on April 29th, when we got there, I think it was a
day or two later, we were in the Sevilla Biltmore, which is right across from the
presidents palace, and they, Castro, tried to assassinate that president, Batista, and we
heard these firecrackers going off and everything, and we thought they were celebrating
the fact that Americans were there, that we were there to play ball, and we found out it
was the revolution they were trying to get started and they were trying to get rid of that
president, but it was exciting. That’s all I can say. 27:05
Interviewer: “So you complete that, and then where do you go next?”
Do you mean from Cuba?
Interviewer: “Yes”
We came over here and there’s a lot of difference you know—I don’t know—I don’t
really know what to say.
Interviewer: “Well, did you go to Grand Rapids?”
6
�Yeah, we went to Grand Rapids when we got back for there. I had one heck of a night
my first night, I didn’t miss hardly a thing. We went twelve, I think it was twelve,
innings, and I got a clipping on that, twelve innings, no runs nothing. I don’t remember
how I got on, but anyway, I scored the one and only run and it showed me coming across
the plate with a big old grin across my face. I really don’t remember if I got a hit or
what, but anyhow, I made the run. 28:01 Then I got a phone call the next morning and I
thought I had a hell of a nice game, and I got a phone call the next morning that I had to
report to Peoria. I said, “What did I do wrong?” I had a good night you know, and I still
didn’t know why I was traded. I believe they started with their team in Peoria in 1946, I
believe, and this was 1947, so apparently they needed a left fielder, I don’t know, but I
thought, “Oh my God, what did I do wrong?” I really hurt my feeling, but you learn to
adjust to it. We were housed there by the Berglands and I believe he was the director or
something of the association, and there were four of us that were housed there. I was
pretty nice. 28:57 Being away so many years and I got there this week and I couldn’t
believe there’s only two of my roommates left—they’ve passed on you know. It was
funny, the only way I knew them was through this—it was 1947 since I’d seen them or
heard from them. I wouldn’t even be here if it wasn’t for my little twelve year old niece
on the computer, she saw the movie. She said, “my great aunt used to play ball. I’m
going to see what I can find out”, so she got on that computer, got a hold of Carol and
started talking to Carol and then Carol sent me some literature and I had no idea the
league was still going on. I thought when I hung my spikes up it was over, but it wasn’t,
it’s gone on all these years, but it was great getting back. 29:55 The people are just
7
�fantastic, yeah, we’ve had so much fun here I hate to go back to California, believe me I
do.
Interviewer: “Well, the league is going to California next year.” 30:29
Yeah, that’s—I’m looking forward to that. That’s about eight hours from where I live. I
live up in the bay area and that’s down south, but I’ll get there if the lord’s willing and I
live that long.
Interviewer: “Now, did you only play in the league that one year?”
Yeah, I came back and I was going to teach the WAVES in the industrial league how to
hook slide. I sure did, I hit third, I hit the sack and my ankle went skewed and turned
absolutely, completely around and snapped off at the ankle. The front was in the back
and the back was in the front. I started out with a cast to here and then to the knee and
ended up with a walking cast for months, so that kind of put the end to it. I never thought
any more about and I didn’t know they were still playing or I would have been there, if I
had to crawl. If I’d of known they were playing. 31:16
Interviewer: “So, did you go back to your job in California?”
Oh yeah, I went back and I worked at it for forty years, and then when the state or the
government passed the law that they had to have equal pay for rank—see what happened,
they were picking these boys up out of school, off the street, and bringing them in and we
would teach them how to inspect bottles, how to pack them and they become our crew
leaders in a month and we’re there twenty-eight years and we’re still teaching them and
they’re moving ahead. Anyhow, the government decided that they should start making
women supervisors, so I did make supervisor, but like I say, it was out in the warehouse
with the teamsters and the warehousemen, and boy that is tough. 32:07 Boy, they’re
8
�unionized let me tell you, but yeah, they did call me in and did offer me a job in the plant
which I knew that part of the department back and forward. Back in Florida I worked
twelve out of the fourteen departments, but I decided I had enough, so I quit or took my
retirement, early retirement, at fifty-eight. I was home about five weeks and my mind—
I’ve always worked and I went to the bar one day and Joanne Weston, the Big Bomber,
the roller derby queen, was in the bar. I walked in there and was going to order a drink
and she said, “hey, watch the bar for me, I got to run over to the bank and I’ll be right
back”, and I said, “I don’t know how to tend bar”, and she said, “if they want a drink, just
ask them what goes in it and if they don’t know, they don’t need it” 33:07 That’s how I
started tending bar for thirteen years. Yeah, and then I finally hung it up. Here I am
again.
Interviewer: “How do you think your experience in sports, the time you spent
playing organized ball, softball and baseball, how do you think that affected you or
helped you in your life or help you to do other things?”
Well, it taught me a lot of self-respect mainly, and it gave me a little more confidence in
myself. I was very shy and it kind of gave me a different look on life. I was a little more
forward and able to speak up and speak my mind, which I never did before. People
would say something and I would cry, I was real backward you know. 34:12 I’m not
now, but I was.
Interviewer: “Did you ever think of yourself as any kind of pioneer, whether it was
in sports or in your job?”
Not really, not really, it was just something we had to do.
Interviewer: “Did you ever see the “A league of Their Own” movie?
9
�I sure did and I was just so excited I couldn’t see straight. I went out—in California it
sold out immediately, that film, because we’re ball minded anyhow, and you know I went
from pillar to post and couldn’t find one and apparently someone had passed away and
my niece down south in Sacramento, she went into a thrift store and she found a tape that
hadn’t even been opened and she called me and sent me the tape, so I have the tape.
35:09 I couldn’t find it at all at home, it really sold, and just about everybody in
California has one. Believe it or not, everybody that had it remembered then that I played
and I had so many letters from young kids wanting autographs and things. I won’t send
an autograph unless it’s on a picture because to me a name is nothing unless you have a
face to go with it, so I go down and have that Copymat and have these eight by tens
made. I have a nice picture with me picking up a bat. I have them made and then I
autograph them and give them to them. I just feel that way about it. What’s a name on a
piece of paper if you don’t know who it is? You know yourself, you write an address
down and a name, but I’ve been trying to get cards made. 36:13 I’ve had so many
requests, but the one that broke my heart was this young fella wrote me and said, “I’m
getting married in September and my wife to be saw your movie and went absolutely
crazy. Would you please get a congratulation card for our wedding and autograph it?
We’ll cherish that until the day we die”, and you know I even sent Carol a letter and if
she can get the whole league or whoever would be available to sign one for them. You
know that’s the kind of letters I would get in the mail and it makes you feel so great that
people are acknowledging you. I mean little kids, I’m eight, I’m ten, I’m twelve, and it
really does something to you. 37:17
10
�Interviewer: “Well, it also makes for a good story, so I would just like to thank you
for coming in and telling it to us today.”
This has been a great thrill, really and truly. Just getting back again and being around all
the old friends, and believe it or not it’s like I never left after all these years. The funny
part is though they got a story going around that it’s my great, great grand child and I
haven’t been married and it’s my great, great niece and I have a picture of her and she’s
adorable. She sent for a uniform and she chose white and she had a picture taken in it
and she sent me the uniform, so I called her and I said, “Claissa, my uniform wasn’t
white, it was khaki”, and she said, “well, I like white”, and she did take a beautiful
picture. This kid just turned thirteen and you would swear she was twenty, a beautiful
girl. Everybody in the league—all the kids in the league said that she should be a model
and I said, “she already is sweetheart”, but that’s how I got in was through this little kid
you know. 38:25 We’re trying to bring her in as an associate and get the younger kids
down south into it.
11
�12
�
Dublin Core
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Title
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All-American Girls Professional Baseball League Interviews
Creator
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Grand Valley State University. History Department
Description
An account of the resource
The All-American Girls Professional Baseball League was started by Philip Wrigley, owner of the Chicago Cubs, during World War II to fill the void left by the departure of most of the best male baseball players for military service. Players were recruited from across the country, and the league was successful enough to be able to continue on after the war. The league had teams based in Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana and Michigan, and operated between 1943 and 1954. The 1954 season ended with only the Fort Wayne, South Bend, Grand Rapids, Kalamazoo, and Rockford teams remaining. The League gave over 600 women athletes the opportunity to play professional baseball. Many of the players went on to successful careers, and the league itself provided an important precedent for later efforts to promote women's sports.
Source
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<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/484">All-American Girls Professional Baseball League Collection, (RHC-58)</a>
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<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Subject
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Sports for women
World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American
All-American Girls Professional Baseball League--Personal narratives
Oral history
Baseball players--Minnesota
Baseball players--Indiana
Baseball players--Wisconsin
Baseball players--Michigan
Baseball players--Illinois
Baseball for women--United States
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Grand Valley State University Libraries, Special Collections and University Archives, 1 Campus Drive, Allendale, MI, 49401
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RHC-58
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video/mp4
application/pdf
Type
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Moving Image
Text
Language
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eng
Date
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2017-10-02
Contributor
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Smither, James
Boring, Frank
Relation
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Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Oral History
A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge.
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The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
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RHC-58_JDenoble
Title
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Denoble, Jerre (Interview transcript and video), 2010
Creator
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Denoble, Jerre
Description
An account of the resource
Jerre Denoble was born in Oakland, California in 1923. She learned to play ball from her father, and while she was a teenager she started playing softball in an industrial league. A friend encouraged her to try out for the AAGPBL, and she joined the league in Cuba for spring training in 1947. She was assigned to Grand Rapids, but after scoring the only run in the season opener, she was sent to Peoria. After playing one season, she went back to her job in California.
Contributor
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Smither, James (Interviewer)
Publisher
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Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives
Subject
The topic of the resource
Oral history
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Video recordings
All-American Girls Professional Baseball League--Personal narratives
Baseball for women--United States
Baseball
Sports for women
World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American
Baseball players--Michigan
Baseball players--Illinois
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Type
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Moving Image
Text
Relation
A related resource
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Date
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2010-08-08
Source
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<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/484">All-American Girls Professional Baseball League Collection, (RHC-55)</a>
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application/pdf
video/mp4
-
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/efb17100d6dbe7c8aead118230005288.mp4
b2630dda90fb4fc8385e1e33475d20fe
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/796f4f4eb5159d98e805ae26dd794852.pdf
34586e5f0c539316dab09b0d9ce6cec0
PDF Text
Text
Grand Valley State University
All American Girls Professional Baseball League Veterans History Project
Interviewee’s Name: Terry Donahue
Length of Interview: (51:37)
Date of Interview: August 4, 2010 at the Reunion of the Professional Girls Baseball League
Interviewed by: James Smither
Transcribed by: Lindsey Thatcher, March 28, 2011
Interviewer: “Let’s begin with your full name and then when and where were you born?
My full name is Theresa, T-H-E-R-E-S-A Donahue. I was born in [Millaville or Melaval]
Saskatchewan, Canada. I was born on a farm, my father farmed. And that’s where I grew up.
Interviewer: “And in what year, when was your birthday?”
1925.
Interviewer: “Okay, born in 1925?”
1925.
Interviewer: “Ah, same as my mother?”
Okay.
Interviewer: “What was your early childhood like?”
I had wonderful parents; we had a happy home life. My, both my parents were very sports
minded people. And I can honestly say that I can never remember not playing with a ball. My, in
fact I remember as a very young child my Dad playing in a game, you know with his men. But I
was very fortunate. I had one brother (01:00), 14 months younger than I was. He was very
athletic and very good. So I had all of that on my side.
Interviewer: “So as a young child you were playing baseball with who? Just your dad and
your brother or did you have a team that you played with?”
Oh no, my mother I can remember going out in the yard with my Dad and brother and my
mother and Dad would knock us a balls and playing catch and so on. And of course as I got older
I would play with the boys, my brother was very good and I tagged along.
Interviewer: “So you were in a farm community?”
Yes.
�Interviewer: “Okay so when you were a kid where did you play baseball, where did you
play?”
Well at school, at school. And then my brother would go with a bunch of boys and I tagged a
long and would play with them, so I have been involved a long time.
(02:00)
Interviewer: “You went to high school I take it?”
Yes.
Interviewer: “Okay, how was your high school experience?”
Oh listen, I played on a girl’s team. And we had we used to have what you would call sports days
and we would play at competition from other schools and so…
Interviewer: “Was this baseball or was this softball?”
This was softball.
Interviewer: “Softball.”
Softball, yeah.
Interviewer: “What position were you playing?”
Then I pitched and played the infield and that was in the school league and then I would play
with my brother and his friends.
Interviewer: “Do you remember Pearl Harbor?”
Yes I can remember my dad and my mother talking about Pearl Harbor.
Interviewer: “Did you have a radio?”
Yes.
Interviewer: “That’s probably where they heard it?”
No television then.
Interviewer: “Right.”
But we did have a radio (03:00) and we played marbles and ping pong and you know and mother
was always very, a doer.
�Interviewer: “Your dad was a farmer?”
Yes.
Interviewer: “Oh okay. Did you have to do chores?”
Yes, when I came home from school I had to milk my cow and I had to do the dishes. And you
know after school you would come home and head out maybe in the mornings gather the eggs,
you know? I wouldn’t trade that life for anything growing up; I wouldn’t want to go back to it.
Interviewer: “How did you first hear about the All American Girls Professional Baseball
League?”
Well I was scouted from the city team to go in to and play with their league; they had a very
good league in the city.
Interviewer: “How did they know about you?”
(03:59)
Well one of the sports days the two teams from Regina and Moosejaw was playing an exhibition
game, and just before their game we were playing in the finals. And I was pitching and the
manager of the Moosejaw Royals saw me there and then I remember him contacting my dad
saying that I would like your daughter to come in for a try out, I was 15 years old. So my mother
said, no way you are going to school. Well my dad saw to it that I went in for my try out. And I
made it. So then some arrangements were made that I would have to finish school and then when
school was finished I could go into the city and play ball for the rest of that season. So school
started.
Interviewer: “Was this baseball, or was this softball?”
(05:00)
This was all softball, all softball.
Interviewer: “Okay, was it a paid team?”
No.
Interviewer: “So you were just playing for fun.”
And it was a very good league.
Interviewer: “Okay.”
�Very good league and that is where I was scouted by the All Americans.
Interviewer: “Okay, so they, somebody from their organization saw you play?”
In 1954 our Moosejaw Royal team won the Western Canadian Championship. And there was a
scout there I think that it was Mr. Bishop and he asked me if I would be interested in coming
down next spring for a tryout with the All American Girls and I think it was in Pascagoula,
Mississippi. I said “Yes I would”. And of course I could hardly wait to tell my parents, because
my mother was not happy.
Interviewer: “What year was this?”
This was in 1954.
Interviewer: “’54?”
No, ’46 I mean.
Interviewer: “No, oh okay yeah.”
(06:00)
Yeah I went into Moosejaw in 1946, and I played 4 years there and in 1945 we won the western
title. Then they asked me to come down in the spring of 1946 to come down to Pascagoula for a
tryout. And mother wasn’t too happy but this is where the chaperones came in. I think mother
thought that maybe I wouldn’t make it. But anyway I came down I remember on that train
getting into Chicago and then going with this group from there to Pascagoula and that was how I
was scouted.
Interviewer: “What was you’re, you are coming from Canada, had you been to the United
States before?”
Never.
Interviewer: “Okay, and then you went into the south?”
Yeah, to Pascagoula.
Interviewer: “What was that experience like?”
My god, well somebody is, well they sort of talked different and I (07:00) was so excited about
having the chance to make this league where I could play ball every day. I can remember telling
my dad once my dream was if I could play ball every day that would be my dream come true. So
I was so excited, that was 1946 when they were adding two new teams to the league. They were
adding Peoria and Muskegon so they needed some new gals.
�Interviewer: “Now you were used to playing softball?”
Yes.
Interviewer: “What kind of ball were you playing with your new position?”
It was softball, fast pitched.
Interviewer: “Okay, well I mean when you were getting into the Professional Baseball
though?”
It was fast pitched.
Interviewer: “Right, but the ball was…?”
12 inch.
Interviewer: “Okay”
It started with 12 inch.
Interviewer: “Okay, so the transition was not that big of a thing for you because you
already had…”
Yes, that’s right. It was the same size ball as we were playing with in Canada.
(08:00)
Interviewer: “But it changed later on though.”
Yes.
Interviewer: “We will talk about that a little later on. So a scout sees you playing in the
softball league and now they have offered you this professional job, and you are going to be
playing in the south.”
They offered me to come down for a try out.
Interviewer: “Right and you passed the try out.”
Yes, I came down I passed. And I’ll never forget that day. There was it seemed to me like
hundreds of girls there all trying and I didn’t know anybody. I remember I remember managers
and people up there with their big pencil and paper and they would call your name and you
would go out and they called my name and I remember I ran out to short stop. And they knocked
me grounders and they got your flies and you had to go, and I was really on that day I was
picking them up, but I got a dirty bounce and it cut my eye there. So the chaperone came out and
�a nurse and they (09:00) said we have to have you get some stitches and I said “I’m not going
anyplace until I’m finished,” I said “put a band aid on it and I’m going back out”. And I did, I
was lucky because I did very well that day. And so, then allocation came and this huge room I
had never seen a room this large and all of these girls in it, and we are all trying to make the
league. And I can remember sitting there and trying to listen for my name. It wasn’t coming and
I thought oh my gosh, I tell you when I heard my name I was the happiest girl in that whole
building, because that meant I made the league. So that I will never forget and even talking about
it I kind of get goose pimples because I was so excited and there were girls crying because they
didn’t make it or they were being traded or so on and so forth, but I was happy.
(10:00)
Interviewer: “So let’s go back over the story, and let’s talk about it”
Well I got to Pascagoula and we worked very hard for two weeks I remember it was so hot and
coming from Canada you know it was cold there in April and I got down there and I worked very
very hard, then came allocation day and I had never seen a room that big in my life and all of
these girls there are all trying to make the league and so anyway they sent me out to short stop
and all of the managers, there was one knocking balls as hard as he could, making you run for it
and all of this. And I did really well, but I had a dirty bounce and it cut my eye, on my head
(11:00) and took me off, the nurse and the chaperone says I think you might need some stitches.
I said put a band-aid on it, I’m going back out and I’m going to finish. And I often thought,
maybe they thought there is a gutsy kid. You know? I don’t know, but anyway I heard my name
and I can tell you I was so excited. I was so happy I could hardly wait to tell my dad and my
mother. So I made it. And then they told me I was going to be with the Peoria Red Wings I was
pleased because that was a brand new team we were adding. So we were sort of, you know there
were a few veterans on it, but I made this Peoria. Great team, great group of gals so…
Interviewer: “How was your first season? You were a rookie. ”
I was a rookie.
Interviewer: “So did you play very much?”
I did, really, for, I filled in a lot of places. You know there were only 15 girls to a team (12:00),
and so you know if a girl was hurt or wasn’t feeling well I went in. And I can tell you one time,
our catcher, our regular catcher broke her finger and our manager Leo Schrall came to me and
said, “Terry have you ever caught?”, I said “Leo, I’ve never caught”. He said “Well you’re going
in”. I said “Okay I’ll do the best I can”, he hands me this great big mitt and I said “Leo I can’t
use that mitt”, I wouldn’t catch the ball it had this big great fat bit. He said “Well, what are you
going to do?” I said “I’ll use my infield glove”. Well I’ll tell you I never forget that day, that day
went 19 innings and it was April 19, 1948. I’ll never forget it because the next day was my
birthday and my knees were mighty sore from catching. And the game was called at midnight
�because the next day (13:00) was Sunday and we couldn’t play into a Sunday. That was my first
experience of catching and I ended up liking the position very well and I did finally get a good
glove. But my hand was mighty sore, with the infield glove but I loved that glove, I still have it.
Interviewer: “You had mentioned earlier about playing utility, could you explain what that
meant?”
Well that meant, I could play any of the positions and fill in whenever a girl was not well or
somebody was hurt. But I never pitched, and I never played first base.
Interviewer: “Where did you stay your first season?”
I stayed with a couple in Peoria, Mr. and Mrs. Turnball. I tell you I can’t tell you how good it, I
can tell you I ended up calling them my United States parents, and I stayed with them all the time
I played in Peoria. And I saw them until the day they died and passed away. They were just like
family to me.
(14:07)
Interviewer: “What was the experience of being away from home I mean you had a good
family life and suddenly you were out in the middle of nowhere so to speak… ”
Oh, I had a wonderful happy life. But I was playing the game of my dream. And I, you know we
were playing every day and if we weren’t playing we were out practicing, I loved it, I loved it.
So I often think you know, some of the girls got homesick. I never got homesick because I knew
I was playing, I was where I wanted to be. And I sent mother and dad the daily paper so they saw
and read all the games.
Interviewer: “That’s wonderful. You were making pretty good money for someone your
age for one thing.”
Yes, I should say so, and for that time.
Interviewer: “So did you send money home, or how did you do that?”
No, I built my little bank account in Peoria. I had my first contact for 50 dollars which was a lot
of money in those days. I think a lot of us were making more money than our poor fathers, you
know.
(15:09)
Interviewer: “What was your social life like the first year?”
Well it was, you know there were a lot of nice guys watching our games and wanting to go out. I
remember you know it was very tempting but we had to get the okay by the chaperone. And
sometimes I wasn’t too happy with “You know, I don’t think you better Terry”, or you
�know…well anyway yeah it was, I got to tell you the people of Peoria were wonderful. They
would have us for lunch, the directors were, you know they would have a boat and take us up
the, I forget the name of the place in Peoria but they were all so nice to us. You know, it was a
good social life. We would play.
(16:04)
Interviewer: “Did you think, you made it very clear about how excited you were about
playing professional baseball,”
Oh absolutely.
Interviewer: “and I realize this was a tough question because it was a long time ago, but
were you thinking, you know this is what I’m going to be doing for my professional career
10 years from now, 5 years…?”
You know, I never thought about it ever ending, I never thought about maybe someday I could
never play this game. I was living; I guess for the moment, I don’t know I was so happy. But I
never thought about that ending. I thought it was just go on and on and on.
Interviewer: “When you got back home from your first season, was there any discussion
with your parents about your future and what you were going to be doing?”
When I got, after the first season I went back home and I took my dad a cap and they had the
newspapers and dad and I would sit and talk for hours and they were on the farm (17:05). And
after I got home and visited with them and saw family and friends I went into Moosejaw and got
a job and then worked in there until the next spring and then I would come back down to the
states.
Interviewer: “Now, I want to get back. Where did you work?”
I worked at a department store.
Interviewer: “Did they know that you were a baseball player?”
Yes and the manager was very proud, very supportive.
Interviewer: “So there was a certain amount of publicity then about the team and you say
that your parents, your father was reading the newspaper. Was there article about your
team and things like that?”
Yes, in the newspaper.
Interviewer: “Okay, so you were kind of a local celebrity.”
Yes, I guess you could put it that way. And Dad was very proud.
�Interviewer: “So how did you know you were going to be playing another year, did they
send you a later?”
We would sign another contract.
Interviewer: “Okay, so a contract was sent to you.”
Exactly.
(18:00)
Interviewer: “Okay, now this time you could sign it on your own because you were 18?”
Yeah you know, there was no question then. Even mother was approving.
Interviewer: “So, what was the second season like?”
Oh gosh, I could hardly wait to get back down, you know. It was just wonderful. I wasn’t a
rookie anymore, and so there were rookies coming in. And I’ll tell you when they rookies came
in I was the first one there to greet them because I was a rookie and I knew. The thing was that it
was a new team that first year I played. So it wasn’t like going into a team where there were
veterans, and you know there were…so the girls were really very nice. But I was always the first
one there to greet a new girl coming in.
(19:00)
Interviewer: “What was the uniform like?”
Oh my, well playing in those dresses and skirts was something else. Especially for sliding, but
Mr. Rigby wanted us to look like young ladies, and play ball like men; and that’s exactly what
we did. I’m going to tell you that because Peoria was the first year, the people thought that they
would go out and get a good laugh and see this novelty of these women playing in skirts. We had
a full house well they weren’t laughing when they saw how well we played, and I can say this
because my landlady and landlord had never seen a game, I don’t think. They came out to have a
good laugh, and they never missed a game after that. So, we won them over.
Interviewer: “You mentioned about the dress and all of that, how difficult was it to play in
that?”
(20:00)
Well, it was kind of a full skirt. I think it bothered the pitchers more than any of us. They would
wind up and the pitchers and it was sort of pen over there skirt because it was so full. And
actually we got used to it and it wasn’t so bad.
�Interviewer: “Well some of them said that they made alterations because I remember one
of you made a wonderful statement and said ‘I reached down to get the ball and all I got
was dress’”
Yes, well it was very full and it did bother the pitchers.
Interviewer: “Did you make any alterations or anything like that?”
I didn’t on mine.
Interviewer: “Okay, so”
And you know they gave us the satin shorts to where under the, but and then they gave us pads
for sliding but they shifted and no one every used them that I know of.
(21:00)
Interviewer: “Oh okay. Wow. Okay.”
But we did have the strawberries. And thank goodness for the chaperones, they were wonderful.
Interviewer: “So you had a few strawberries yourself?”
Oh, yes.
Interviewer: “Oh my gosh, my gosh.”
But you know, I don’t think anybody really minded. The chaperones were great and they.
Interviewer: “They were responsible for cleaning the wound?”
They were wonderful women, yeah.
Interviewer: “I heard that it stung quite a bit though when they put that… ”
Oh yeah, when they would put that stuff on it, it would sting.
Interviewer: “Oh my gosh.”
Interviewer: “Let’s get back to the second season.”
Okay.
Interviewer: “Did you stay in the same house with those two people that you said were so
wonderful, did you stay in the same house the second year?”
Yes.
�Interviewer: “So they knew you were coming back.”
Oh yes, I stayed all four years there. Yeah, and then I was just part of the family. You know you
had to pay for our room (22:03) and go out for our meals. Well it got so they wouldn’t even take
my money for my room. They were just terrific. They had no children, and they just took me
over. They were wonderful, wonderful people.
Interviewer: “Now you were staying by yourself or did you have a roommate?”
I stayed, I had a roommate and she was traded, and then I stayed quite awhile by myself and then
another girl came to town and needed a place and she came and stayed there also with me, and
they liked her too. So, I think that most of the girls had wonderful places to stay and the people
were so nice.
Interviewer: “So the end of your second season, you come back home again, and you are
working in the same place”
Yes, yes, my boss was so good, he said “Terry anytime you want to come here again the doors
open”
Interviewer: “That’s wonderful.”
So he was wonderful (23:00). So being a Canadian, to keep in shape I played girls hockey. So
when I came down in the spring I was in shape. My legs were in good shape and I was ready to
go. So that was a good advantage for me. Like the California and Florida girls they were in shape
they played all winter. But I played girls hockey and kept in shape.
Interviewer: “Tell us about your manager, how was your manager?”
Our first manager was Johnny Gottselig, he was a famous hockey player. I don’t know if he was
the first, maybe he was. Then we had several others and then we had Louis Schrall and he was
from the university there. So we had good managers. They taught us a lot, you know Leo taught
us the sliding.
Interviewer: “I was going to ask that, because you came from a baseball background, you
already knew how to play, but you never played professionally, formally, and some of the
girls said that there were things that they taught you that either you had a bad habit from
before, didn’t realize it was a bad habit, was there things that they taught you that you
thought ‘Oh I should do it this way.’?”
(24:16)
I can’t recall anything. But when I played in Moosejaw and there was an excellent league and
there was excellent coaching. I think that that was to our advantage too. We had very good
coaching in Moosejaw.
�Interviewer: “Now did your manager treat you like a woman, or did he treat you like a
baseball player?”
Oh, he was tough, you know. I think you treated us like a baseball player. I mean, he didn’t baby
us, and we could take it. I mean we had to read the rules and we would get on that bus and he
would question us. So I think you know he was, I think he was treating us more like a baseball
player, which was great.
(25:00)
Interviewer: “How were the road trips?”
Oh gosh. We would finish a ball game and shower and get on that old bus. And if we lost, we it
was very quiet, and if we won we would still for a hundred miles. You know, I never ever heard
anybody complain about the road trips. But I, you know we couldn’t wear slacks, we would get
on the bus we would get in our jeans and traveling all night, but if we stopped we had to get out
of those jeans and put on a skirt. We not even, I can remember several nights we’d stop and we
would have to get on our skirt. And Mr. Rigley wanted us to look like ladies, and we did.
Interviewer: “You were very young of course, the fact that you were doing a road trip all
night. The next day, what was your day like? In other words you were on the bus all night
you arrived and it’s the town you are going to be playing. Walk us through what you had to
do, you went to sleep? Or you… ”
(26:11)
Well yes, we would get into a hotel. Like if we were traveling form Peoria to Muskegon, which
is a long ways, we would get into the hotel and get a couple winks of sleep and sometimes he
would get us out there earlier before a game for more running and so on, and sometimes we
would have to go out for a work out in the morning. It all depended on how things were going. If
we weren’t winning we would have to get out there and practice. But those bus trips and we look
back on them now and they were fun.
Interviewer: “Yeah, you had mentioned about the fans the first year, they come out kind of
laughing and you proved them wrong. How were the road trips, in terms of the road trips
going to other towns how were the fans?”
(27:03)
They were great too, I’m sure the same thing happened there. We always had good crowds. I
think that it was 1948 we drew a million people, the league. And then in 1947 we trained in
Havana, Cuba.
Interviewer: “Tells about that.”
�That was exciting.
Interviewer: “Well you had never been out of the, well I was going to say that you had
never been out of the country, but you are from Canada!”
So we get into Cuba and we trained there. Oh it was hot. And we trained there very hard for two
weeks and this was before Castro. I can remember one day they told us to bring sandwiches into
the hotel because we were not going to practice or go out the next day because the army was
walking down the streets. I can remember it was scary. Anyway the Brooklyn Dodgers were
training there at the same time we were (28:00) and we outdrew them. They came over and they
said “What is going on over here?”, and when they saw how well we played they couldn’t
believe it. Dottie Kamenshek, was the first baseman for Rockford Beeches. They said if she had
been a man they would have offered her $50,000 on the spot. In those days that was a lot, but
that was a fun time.
Interviewer: “You played against Cuban teams?”
No, we played, we played, well we were playing against, you know our league.
Interviewer: “Just like you would if you were in the states, okay.”
Yeah.
Interviewer: “I know a couple girls got recruited out of Cuba”
Yes, yes. And we had a couple on the Peoria Red Wings. And they were fun, fun gals and in fact
I think we have one Cuban woman here.
Interviewer: “I think we have done her interview already”
(29:00)
Yeah and she’s very funny.
Interviewer: “Yeah, so your trip to Cuba, you come back. Now you are in your third
season, now isn’t it about this time that the ball changed? ”
Yes, in 1948 we went to side arm. So it wasn’t side arm, some of the girls were still going the
windmill; side arm came out in 1948. Then a couple more years and the overhead took over.
Interviewer: “How about you, how was that transition for you?”
Well I tell you; at that point I was doing more catching. I was talking about 1949, it was
overhead, almost completely overhead by then. And I was doing more catching. And in the 1950,
I signed my contract for 1950, and I did not sign it because by that time they had lengthened the
�bases (30:00). Every two years they would lengthen the bases and make the ball smaller. And
they changed the size of the ball 6 times, from the 12 inch to the…I think it was 194-, I didn’t
sign the 1950 contract. As it was I had an opportunity to go into Chicago and I was offered a
contract to play fast pitched in Chicago. Because I was doing more catching, I thought that’s
what I would do would go into Chicago and play professional there in the fast pitched because I
was afraid my arm wasn’t strong enough. And it was a hard decision to make, but a lot of the
girls came in. I know in 1950 in Chicago, we had several, I was on the team, and Sophie Curry,
and Joanne Wenners. There was a lot of us on the team.
(30:51)
Interviewer: “This is outside of the league?”
Yes. So that’s why I didn’t sign the 1950 contract, because of the distance and I didn’t feel my
arm was strong enough. And I had the opportunity to go into the city. But it was a hard decision,
because you know it was such a good league.
Interviewer: “This is a paid, this is also a professional team? I didn’t even know about
this.”
Yes
Interviewer: “And it’s outside of the All American Girls Professional Baseball League?”
Yes. Yes.
Interviewer: “It was a fast pitched, professional women’s team.”
Yes, well you know by 1950 the boys were coming back from service and people had more
money and there were more things to do. So, I believe the, the attendance wasn’t as big as it used
to be, so that was my decision. I think it was the right one, for the simple reason that I didn’t
think my arm was strong enough and I was doing more catching. But it was a tough decision.
(32:02)
Interviewer: “How long did you stay with the fast pitched?”
Two years, and then, but in Chicago you could get a job and play because we didn’t play outside
the Chicago area. I got my job, and I was playing at night. And I liked my job so well that I
finally just quit playing and so I played there, I worked there 38 years and then I retired.
Interviewer: “I have to know, what, with the enthusiasm you had for playing baseball,
what job could possibly replace?”
�Well I think I finally realized that the time has come. I was Canadian, and it was….I thought I
might play longer in the Chicago area. I got my job, and I was doing well there. And then in the
contract if you were hurt, you were responsible, and I thought now well maybe it was time to
make the change. It was hard.
(33:04)
Interviewer: “What job did you take?”
I worked with an interior design firm, was a very very good one. We hired architects and
designers and I was in the business end of it. I liked my job, I was there 38 years.
Interviewer: “Where did you get the training to do something like that?”
I went to night school because I never had the opportunity to go to college. And I got my job,
went to night school and it all worked out, I was very fortunate because I love the people I
worked with. But I got to tell you that I couldn’t go to ball game that first year, because I wanted
to be out there. It was hard.
Interviewer: “Did the, did your coworkers know you were a baseball player?”
(33:58)
No, I never talked about. Nobody knew that I had played professional ball. If I had told them
they probably thought that I was crazy, so let me tell you, when that movie started all hell broke
loose. Oh, phone was ringing, they wanted to interview, television and radio. It was incredible
but very exciting.
Interviewer: “What was your reaction to that?”
Well we were excited, but I can tell you there was 50 of us girls, met all the stars and starlets in a
hotel in [Muskogee]. We had to tell them about our experiences and help them throw a ball and
so on. And of course Madonna threw just like a girl, and oh we thought, and we got very upset to
think that they had a Madonna in that movie, because we didn’t have a Madonna in our League,
and we told them so. And they said that they had her under their thumb and she had a very small
part. Well anyway, it ended up that we got to like Madonna, she was a pretty good gal, a hard
worker.
(35:12)
Interviewer: “Well the combination of her and Rosie O’Donnell, really made that part of
the movie. They were perfect with each other and for each other.”
Oh absolutely, Rosie O’Donnell had the best ability. She could throw and catch.
�Interviewer: “Well someone told me that she actually knew how to play baseball.”
Oh she did, but Madonna, forget it. Oh, anyway it was pretty exciting because we got to beat
them all.
Interviewer: “I want you to think about this for a moment, you have gone years and years
working in a place that you love to work, baseball is way behind you, suddenly this movie
comes out, did you think what is all of this hoopla about? Or did you just think well, I guess
people think this a pretty big deal.”
Well we were I know I was very excited to think (36:02) that this movie was going to tell our
story, which is something we love doing. We didn’t know how it was going to come out. We
were very worried until we saw it, but when we saw it we were very pleased. Because it wasn’t a
documentary as you know, it was a…
Interviewer: “A Hollywood movie”
A Hollywood movie, I remember going to Rockford and to see the movie for the first time with
all of the girls there and we had tears, we were really excited. And except for that movie nobody
would have known about it. When that came out, and the people at work couldn’t believe it, that
I had played professional. So it was pretty exciting, oh goodness gracious. You know we were
being interviewed, we weren’t talkers and we would never, it was incredible. People just wanted,
I said well if you want an interview come to my apartment because we were running around like
crazy, we all were.
(37:13)
Interviewer: “What is your reaction now that several years have passed since that movie?
It hasn’t, it’s still being shown on television, and people still talk about it. I teach at the
University, I get kids 20 years old as soon as I say ‘League of their Own’, they say ‘Oh
yeah, I love that movie’ they may have seen it when they were a little kid. When I tell my
students that I am doing a documentary about it them…oh my goodness, they think I
am…see you have kind of rubbed off on me, your fame has rubbed off on me a little bit,
they think that is the coolest thing.”
I got to tell you a funny story. One day I had gone to mass that Sunday and I fainted and they
hauled me off to the closest hospital and this at home in Chicago. Of course, they were checking
me, they had me they were going for the heart and I can remember one day laying there and this
little Puerto Rican nurse came in (38:09). And she said “Oh you are watching a movie”,
happened to be A League of their Own, and I was laying there and I thought this is great I’ll get
to see our movie. She comes in and I say “I’m watching a movie”, and she says “Oh what is it
about?” and said “Oh it’s about the women playing ball in the ‘40’s, and I said I was one of those
women and I tried to help Madonna throw a ball. Well I saw the look on her face, she turned
around and went out so fast and pretty soon another nurse came in. She said “Oh you are
watching a movie” and I said “Yeah”. So I told her the same thing. They thought I was crazy.
�Then two doctors came in, and they thought well there is nothing wrong with this woman, that’s
all they had. That was so funny.
Interviewer: “Once again I want to get back to what is your reaction to all of this?”
(39:04)
We were overwhelmed, we were overwhelmed, really. We couldn’t believe that we were getting
all of this attention. Because anytime you mention that movie people go crazy. I think we were
really overwhelmed and so excited.
Interviewer: “How is it now? It’s been several years and you have had a chance to realize
that this whole country, if not parts of this world think that this is an amazing period of
time and what you did was really extraordinary”
Well even now I don’t think that it’s changed much since the first time it came out. You
mentioned to somebody that you’ve played and you know they will see my ring and I might be
paying a bill or doing something. “Oh, that’s a pretty ring”, you know and we’ll get talking and
I’ll say “Have you heard of A League of Their Own?” and you tell them that you’ve played they
just get so excited. It’s incredible.
(40:02)
Interviewer: “What do you think about that?”
Well, you know what I can say, what I think, I think I was very fortunate to have had the
opportunity to be able to play professional baseball with the All American League. I think that
we were at the right place at the right time. I feel very fortunate. And to have played with such a
great group of women, great group of women. I think that I’m glad Mr. Wrigley included the
Canadians, and I think that we did prove that women can play professional ball as well as men;
we can’t hit the ball as hard or as far but we can make all of those same plays and sometimes
better, I’ve seen maybe a few. But, it is. I think we are very fortunate.
Interviewer: “One of the things that is really impressive to me, is the number of you that
have gone on beyond that period of time and have done, some of you became PhD’s, some
of you worked, where does those few years fit into your idea of your life? It’s only a small
part, but where does that fit in terms of your life?”
(41:16)
I think that playing in the All American taught me a lot. You know you are team player, you are
team worker. You get along with people. I think that it did a lot for me and for all of us. I think it
fit in very well.
Interviewer: “Why did you come to the first reunion, why did you come to the reunion?”
�Let me tell you, the very first reunion was 1982, in a Holiday Inn just east of Michigan Avenue
in Chicago. And that I will never forget. We had to have name tags because some of us got
heavier, some of us lost our baby fat, and that was a wonderful reunion. And every reunion was
wonderful; but that very first one where we hadn’t seen one another for years and years was a
great reunion. You know, I don’t say one was better than another, I think they are all great. It
was so wonderful to see the gals you played, and it is just amazing how sometimes you can
remember a play. I remember when I threw you out or something, so it’s been great.
(42:35)
Interviewer: “You have a family?”
I never married. But I do have family which I love dearly and I’m going to be with them
September 1, I’m going to celebrate my 85th birthday. They are having a big party.
Interviewer: “How did your family react to the movie and all of the because before that
they knew you were a baseball player, but not a big movie star?”
(43:00)
No, well my mother and dad of course on the farm, they never went to movies. By this time,
when the movie came out my dad had passed away but my mother was living closer to my
brother and his family and when that movie came out they gave all of my family a free ticket to
go see this movie. And mother could hardly wait. When the movie was over she walked out with
my nephew and she looked at him and said “I thought Terry played in a nice league”, because
she mentioned Tom Hanks, so that was funny. So they were all very proud and very excited
about it.
Interviewer: “This is a big question, maybe you have thought about it, maybe you haven’t
thought about it, I don’t know. But where do you think the All American Girls Professional
Baseball League fits into the whole scheme of history, of American history?”
(44:00)
I think that it was an important thing at that time, because of the war I think that we did help
people have a place to go and watch us play. I hope that it can continue. I think there are some
young gals that are trying to get a team, I know I talked to them yesterday and I’m going to go
and see them. But I hope it continues because I think there is a part.
Interviewer: “What do you say to young people, when little girls come up to you and start
talking to you?”
Listen if you have the ability, and the desire and the love for the game, go for it, go for it.
�Interviewer: “Any particular moments that you played that really stick out, what are the
stories you tell while you are here at the reunion?”
(45:01)
I’ll tell you there is such a great group; we had such a great time but after one season there was
three of us Canadians going back home. So we decided to go buy a car. We got $25 each and we
bought this car for $75. And we took off for Canada. No, before we went on our last road trip
we took the car into the mechanic, and said we just bought this car, we’re going to drive it to
Canada when we got off our road trip. Just check it over, but we don’t want you to do anything
to this car because we don’t want a big bill. So, we go off and come back from the road trip and
we go back to the mechanics. “We fixed your car, it’s all ready to go”. We said “We told you not
to do anything”. We said “Well how much is the bill?” he said “$2.50”. He put a new switch or
something, you know. So anyway we took off for Canada. He said, “You will make it you don’t
go more than 30 miles a day”. Well that was a fantastic trip. So that was one, you know, that was
after the season. But, you know it was just things like this. You see them at the reunion and now
we laugh about it. You know?
(46:25)
Interviewer: “Right, right. Any particular moments of the game that particularly stands
out? Either a home run or did you catch something or is there anything you can
remember?”
You know, you hear this…there is no crying in baseball. I remember one night I was catching
and a gal laid down a bunt, and I got the bunt and threw it to the first and it went miles over the
first baseman. Do you think I had a tear? Yes I did. That was one. But I think catching the 19
innings, there were a lot of good moments. Peoria had never won a championship, but I can tell
you we had a great team. Great team.
Interviewer: “Who were the real challenges? What teams really gave you the biggest
trouble?”
(47:14)
I think those 4 teams that started that always had good teams, like Rockford, Kenosha, Racine,
and South Bend. They had good teams; I think they were the tough ones.
Interviewer: “You know we are from Grand Rapids, all of us are from Grand Rapids.”
Are you? Grand Rapids? I remember Grand Rapids. They were good too, the Chicks, oh yeah.
Connie Wisniewski, the pitcher, oh she was good. She was one that went into Chicago later. But
they were all good teams, they were all good.
�Interviewer: “Well I want to just thank you so much.”
You are all from Grand Rapids?
Interviewer: “Yeah”
(48:01)
You never saw us play then, you are too young.
Interviewer: “Too young for that I think yeah, yeah.”
I remember Bill Allington who coached the Rockford Peaches had a movie and as far as I know
that is the only one there is but one of the girls played it once at one of the reunions it was fun to
see it…
Interviewer: “Do you remember who it was that played it?”
You know I can’t remember.
Interviewer: “Because we are trying to find as much as we can for the film.”
As far as I know Bill Allington was the coach of the Rockford Peaches, and I think it was the
Rockford Peaches playing the Peoria Red Wings. I might be wrong about playing the Peoria Red
Wings but there was, he had made a home movie at that time. I don’ think it was the whole game
but I wonder who would know about it.
Interviewer: “I’m going to start asking. But you said it was Bill Allington?”
Yeah, oh he was the manager, of the Rockford Peaches.
Interviewer: “Yeah”
(49:07)
Yeah.
Interviewer: “We heard that there is a film of a whole game somewhere?”
Well that could have been a whole game too. I can’t say yes or no, all I know that there was one,
someplace along the way I saw clips of it, I’ll have to ask.
Interviewer: “I’ve seen one which is a news feature at the time, so it wasn’t the whole game.
But it was news, you know how the people would come out there and they would
interview?”
No, that wasn’t this. This was…
�Interviewer: “This was a home movie, he…yeah”
And there weren’t too many at the time. That would be a good one to get.
Interviewer: “Yeah, absolutely.”
I’ll certainly ask around too.
Interviewer: “Please, I would really appreciate that. Did you go to the ball game
yesterday?”
Yes I was.
Interviewer: “Tell us about that. What was that like.”
Oh listen, the Chicago White Sox won.
(50:00)
Interviewer: “How was the baseball game?”
Oh it was great but I tell you it was really hot out there. We left after the 6th inning. It just was so
hot.
Interviewer: “You guys were honored and brought out.”
Oh, they were wonderful; we were honored and came out onto the field. They had a very good
crowd, yeah.
Interviewer: “Lots of applause.”
Oh yes, all of these things are happening to us old gals, that’s what is keeping us young.
Interviewer: “That’s wonderful. Just a quick question about, you said that it was difficult
for you to even go to a game after you…”
Yeah.
Interviewer: “When did that change eventually? Did you go to ball games regularly after?”
Yeah, after that I went there and I wanted to be out in it. And it was really hard. But I was going,
I started night school, I was working, and I had made the decision that that was the proper thing
to do. And as I look back I think I made the right decisions. Because even that league in the
Chicago league, the boys were coming back from the service and the crowds weren’t so good
either.
Interviewer: “Well it worked out for you.”
�It worked out, no complaints. And here we are.
Interviewer: “You look beautiful, you do, you do.”
Oh, thank you.
Interviewer: “Thank you so much. It was a pleasure.”
Thank you. And you are all from Grand Rapids?
Interviewer: “Yup.”
(51:37)
��
Dublin Core
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Title
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All-American Girls Professional Baseball League Interviews
Creator
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Grand Valley State University. History Department
Description
An account of the resource
The All-American Girls Professional Baseball League was started by Philip Wrigley, owner of the Chicago Cubs, during World War II to fill the void left by the departure of most of the best male baseball players for military service. Players were recruited from across the country, and the league was successful enough to be able to continue on after the war. The league had teams based in Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana and Michigan, and operated between 1943 and 1954. The 1954 season ended with only the Fort Wayne, South Bend, Grand Rapids, Kalamazoo, and Rockford teams remaining. The League gave over 600 women athletes the opportunity to play professional baseball. Many of the players went on to successful careers, and the league itself provided an important precedent for later efforts to promote women's sports.
Source
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<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/484">All-American Girls Professional Baseball League Collection, (RHC-58)</a>
Rights
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<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Subject
The topic of the resource
Sports for women
World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American
All-American Girls Professional Baseball League--Personal narratives
Oral history
Baseball players--Minnesota
Baseball players--Indiana
Baseball players--Wisconsin
Baseball players--Michigan
Baseball players--Illinois
Baseball for women--United States
Publisher
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Grand Valley State University Libraries, Special Collections and University Archives, 1 Campus Drive, Allendale, MI, 49401
Identifier
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RHC-58
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video/mp4
application/pdf
Type
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Moving Image
Text
Language
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eng
Date
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2017-10-02
Contributor
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Smither, James
Boring, Frank
Relation
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Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Oral History
A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge.
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The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
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RHC-58_TDonahue
Title
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Donahue, Terry (Interview transcript and video), 2010
Creator
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Donahue, Terry
Description
An account of the resource
Terry Donahue was born in 1925 in a farming community in Saskatchewan, and grew up playing baseball with her family and friends, and softball at school. At the age of fifteen, she was recruited onto the Moosejaw Royals, a women's softball team, and was spotted by American scouts from there and went to the All American Girls Professional Baseball League in 1946. She played four seasons for the Peoria Redwings, starting as a utility player and winding up as a catcher. She left the league in 1950 for a softball league in Chicago, and stayed there to work for an interior design firm.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Smither, James (Interviewer)
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives
Subject
The topic of the resource
Oral history
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Video recordings
All-American Girls Professional Baseball League--Personal narratives
Baseball for women--United States
Baseball
Sports for women
World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American
Baseball players--Illinois
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Type
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Moving Image
Text
Relation
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Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2010-08-06
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/484">All-American Girls Professional Baseball League Collection, (RHC-55)</a>
Format
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application/pdf
video/mp4
-
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/b89abfdde8eb0e3b2d427f9d0e37e585.mp4
772cfd10ed490a12676842267d5dc9ac
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/fbe8bde51cf8d2bda2cddde31cc25030.pdf
d32158bc2e6dff00da37d1a1c28e7d05
PDF Text
Text
ORAL HISTORY INTERVIEW
GLORIA CORDES ELLIOTT
Women in Baseball
Born: Staten Island, New York, September 1931
Resides: Staten Island, New York
Interviewed by: James Smither PhD, GVSU Veterans History Project, August 6, 2010,
Detroit, MI at the All American Girls Professional Baseball League reunion.
Transcribed by: Joan Raymer, March 12, 2011
Interviewer: “Gloria can you begin by giving us some background on yourself? To
start with, where and when were you born?”
I was born on Staten Island, New York on September 1931
Interviewer: “And what did your family do for a living at that time?”
My father, he worked, as a carpenter in New York City and my mother was a homemaker
with eleven children, you know, it was about all she had time to do.
Interviewer: “Did your father have work during the thirties? Could he keep you
fed?”
Yes he did and he was very good at that. He had a good job and the money at that time
was nothing like today, but it was sufficient for that time period.
Interviewer: “How did you wind up getting started in sports?”
Well, I was one of eleven children, I have five sisters and five brothers and my three
younger brothers were very close to my age, so I spent a lot of time with them. My two
older brothers, they were professional baseball players and I use to watch them all the
time. One was a pitcher and he showed me how to throw different pitches. 14:03
Interviewer: “And did you get to play baseball with them?”
I got to play with my younger brothers and our friends in the area. You know, just pickup games—choose sides and find an empty field where you could play and that was
1
�about most of it. We didn’t have anything for girls in that time period. Girls were just
not allowed to play ball or be on boys teams and there were no sports for girls in the
schools.
Interviewer: “By the time you got to the high school level there were some girls
sports and opportunities that weren’t there before.”
Not at the school I went to, no, and I don’t think any of the schools on Staten Island had
girls sports just yet.
Interviewer: “What about youth groups or things like that?”
Well, like I said, the boys, they belonged to the youth groups, the PAL, the CYL, and
they tried to get me on their team because I was their pitcher. The same thing there, no
girls were allowed. 15:02
Interviewer: “Ok, could you play other sports with some of these groups, basketball
or softball?”
Yes, they had basketball for the girls at the time at that was at the PAL center and I just
got to meet these girls through my playing softball in the street. Someone that was
managing the girls’ softball team asked me if I was interested in playing, so I said, “yes”,
and that’s how I met some of my friends from the other part of Staten Island. Of course,
we didn’t have a car and at that point we didn’t even really have bicycles, but you didn’t
really get to see too many people out of your own area.
Interviewer: “So, if you were going to go play softball with these people, how would
you get to the games?”
I did a lot of walking and if it was pretty far you could get a bus for five cants at the time,
so that wasn’t too bad. 15:56
2
�Interviewer: “Now, as you were getting into your teenage years, you’re playing in
different ways, did you know anything about the Girls All American Baseball
League?”
No, I had no idea of this baseball league, not until 1949. There were two touring teams
that were touring the east coast and they came to Staten Island and they played a game at
one of our baseball fields. It was advertised in the local paper, so a few of my friends and
myself, we went to watch the game. Before the game started they asked if anyone was
interested in trying out to come down on the field and they would take a look at you.
Interviewer: “So, you went to this game without even expecting to tryout?”
Definitely, just to watch a girl’s game that we never even knew existed.
Interviewer: “So, how do they handle the tryouts? What do they do?”
First he asked if anyone pitched with a baseball, knowing that not too many girls played
baseball, so I told him I did, but like I always say, if he asked if anyone could catch, I
would have said yes. It wouldn’t have been the truth, but I would have learned in a
hurry. 17:10
Interviewer: “So, what happened at the tryout?”
At tryouts he just had me thow a few pitches and he told me I’d hear from them and in a
few weeks I did. I received a contract and I was told to go to South Bend, Indiana where
they had tryouts for all the girls they picked up on these tours, so all the girls that tried
out like I did, were in South Bend, Indiana in May the following year just before spring
training started. The managers down there would watch us for whatever positions we
played and they could choose what they needed to fill their teams. 17:50
3
�Interviewer: “Now at that point were their some people who were getting cut and
didn’t get to make the team? If they got the kind of invitation you got were they
probably going to play?”
No, everyone was still afraid of being cut whether you signed any forms of any type, you
were still eligible to be cut, but I was put on the Muskegon Lassies team and they put me
on a bus to where Muskegon had their spring training and Max Carey was manager of the
Fort Wayne Daisies at the time and that’s who we were having our training with.
Interviewer: “So, you had the two teams training together?”
Yes
Interviewer: “Do you remember where it was you were doing that?”
Cape Girardeau, Missouri
Interviewer: “What was at Cape Girardeau?”
Actually, not too much, coming from New York. One of the big rivers there, I believe it
was the Mississippi and I said, “Wow, I get to see the Mississippi River”, and that was
nothing I expected to do. 18:57
Interviewer: “So, what was it like for you? A lot of the women who joined the
league came from small towns or the country or wherever, but come from the big
city, so what sort of adjustments did you have to make when you left home and went
out there?”
Not really too much, I mean—see, New York City is five boroughs and Staten Island is
more small town than the other four boroughs, so it wasn’t that much different.
Interviewer: “Describe, a little bit, the experience in Cape Girardeau. What was it
like? What was the weather like? What were the facilities like?”
4
�The weather was nice down there and we trained outside except for one day we had rain
and we had indoor facilities to work in, in case of rain. You couldn’t do as much as you
did outside, but it was sufficient. 19:53
Interviewer: “All right, now, when you were down there in training, were all the
veteran players there too?”
Yes, they were there already.
Interviewer: “Were their any particular players or people who paid attention to
you or game you some coaching or were you just all working individually?”
Are you talking about before or when I got there?
Interviewer: “When you got there.”
Before, I had some pretty good coaching. When I got there they just, you know, had us
work out with the veterans at our own positions. They would have us slight pitch to the
veterans and that was kind of scary because these girls were good and I didn’t have any
formal experience what so ever, but it worked out ok. After we trained for a couple of
days we would have games against Fort Wayne and I was complimented by Max Carey
at that point because he came up to me in the hotel after the game and he said, “I know a
lot of you young ladies don’t know if you’re going to play or be sent home, but don’t you
worry, you will not be sent home, because if they release you, I’ll pick you up”, so that
felt pretty good. 21:07
Interviewer: “What pitches did you throw?”
My brother taught me to throw a curve ball, a knuckle ball; I had a pretty good fastball,
and once in a while what we always called a drop, which drops straight down, not break
sideways.
5
�Interviewer: “Once you completed training in Cape Girardeau, did you
immediately go up to Muskegon or what did you do next?”
We went up to Muskegon and the season started.
Interviewer: “Did you do any barnstorming along the way? Did you play games in
route or just go on up north?”
I think we went right up to Muskegon. We finished all of spring training and went right
on up to Muskegon and the season was just getting ready to start. 21:51
Interviewer: “What kinds of rules and regulations did they have in place still for
the women on these teams?”
They had a lot more before I got there, thankfully, but we did have rules. We had to
always appear in feminine attire in public and you weren’t supposed to swear or drink or
smoke in public, which I didn’t do any of those things anyway, I was only eighteen and it
didn’t affect me. There were rules to always be on good behavior, they didn’t want
rowdiness and stuff like that. They wanted you to appear in public as a lady and that, you
know. We always say they wanted us to look like ladies and play like men.
Interviewer: “Did they have a chaperone for the team?’
There was always a chaperone, yes; in case a girl got hurt she would be there to take care
of her. She took care of our housing for us and when we were on the road she would take
care of the rooms and make sure everybody had their rooms and in the hotels they could
make sure you met your curfew and stuff like that. You had a curfew after games, which
was plenty of time. 23:04 On the road there wasn’t too much you could do anyway.
Interviewer: “Did you like the chaperones? Were they good people?”
6
�Oh, they were fine, and some of them were ball players themselves, so they knew what
we were going through and how to handle everything and they were like a second mother
to us.
Interviewer: “Do you remember playing your first regular season game?”
No, because I wasn’t in the starting rotation, and I was always told that I was going to be
ready to be the relief pitcher certain nights and I just never really got into the game. I
must have gotten into five games in Kalamazoo because there was a record for five
games. At that point we had moved to Kalamazoo, Michigan.
Interviewer: “You were at Muskegon first, right?”
Muskegon, and I guess they weren’t doing well as far as drawing crowds and they were
looking for a new city to try to play in and they tried out Kalamazoo and drew very good
crowds there. 24:12 I guess they talked it over and Kalamazoo became the Kalamazoo
Lassies. They were still going strong after the 1954 season and we would have kept
playing. We were doing very well financially.
Interviewer: “What were the fans like? What do you remember about them?”
They were great. You know how some people thought they would heckle and stuff like
that, and that may have happened in the beginning, but like I say, I wasn’t there and
fortunately or unfortunately, however you want to look at it, I missed a lot of that. I
never met a fan that, you know, would heckle anyone or ridicule or make comments that
we not complementary, but I thought our fans were great. 25:03
Interviewer: “And what kinds of people liked to come to the games? Were they
older, younger, kids, men, women?”
7
�You had families coming to the games, you had men, you had young boys, teenagers and
the young girls were very interested and their parents would come with them, so it was
really a family atmosphere.
Interviewer: “How long did you play or what years did you play?”
I played the last five years of the league, 1950 through 1954.
Interviewer: “Ok, and over the course of that time you moved around a certain
amount? You mentioned having your team move from Muskegon to Kalamazoo,
but did you play for other teams as well?”
Yes I did, after we moved to Kalamazoo, it was a couple of weeks after that, I was told
that Racine needed a couple of pitchers and that I was being sent up there because they
were making trades for infielders, which Kalamazoo needed. That’s the way they, at that
point in time, tried to keep the teams balanced, which would make for better baseball.
26:05 Make it more competitive rather than have one team loaded up like the Yankees
you know, and they kept it pretty good that way.
Interviewer: “Now when you went to Racine, was that when you really got to pitch
more?”
Yes, I was put right in the rotation up in Racine, so that was a good move for me at that
time.
Interviewer: “Do you remember any of the starts that you make or the games that
you played when you first started?”
I know I did pretty well—I pitched the—I started ten games after that, I had five wins and
five losses, but that doesn’t really tell the story. I had pitched some good games, but I
8
�pitched against some pros, who were also very good pitchers, and I thought that was good
for me at that time. 26:55
Interviewer: “Did you have good defense behind you?”
Yes, in Racine I had very good defense behind me. In Kalamazoo we had a lot of rookies
and I think the reason for that was, the man that took over was from the touring teams
and he said that his girls on tour could compete in the league, so he picked up a lot of the
girls that came up from the tour and made it into the league and he picked a lot of those
up with me, someone who hadn’t played at all, but you know, it was just one of those
things. It wasn’t a good offensive team basically and defensively we had some very good
players.
Interviewer: “But you would have some good infielders to spare to send over to
Kalamazoo when they sent their extra pitchers.”
Right
Interviewer: “What kind of living arrangements did you have in these places?”
We lived with host teams, with host families, sorry. That was a job for the chaperone.
They would advertise for anyone who had extra rooms and would like to host a ball
player and the chaperone would have to check them out and be sure they had the rooms
and that they weren’t putting some of their own family member out. 28:17 I guess that
was a big job for her, but in Kalamazoo I don’t think you could go wrong no matter who
you stayed with. That was a fantastic town.
Interviewer: “Now, was Racine different as a place to stay?”
No, I stayed with a good host family there. The woman had an older son, he was in the
navy and there was another ball player there at the time, so there were two of us staying
9
�at that house. I was just like—in Racine though it was harder to get around and you
needed a car or had to know the bus routes and things like that.
Interviewer: “When you were living in Racine, could you get a day and go down to
Chicago or did you just pretty much stay there?”
You pretty much stayed there. The only traveling I did was when we were traveling on
the road. 29:01
Interviewer: “All right, and how did they get you from place to place when you
were playing on the road?”
Well, we used basically Greyhound buses or that type of bus to get us back and forth.
When we got back to Kalamazoo, the following year, they had their own bus, so we had a
little better bus ride because they took some seats out and put a refrigerator in and had it
loaded with soda and then in the back they put a table and some of us liked to play cards.
I liked to, but I couldn’t get to the back of the bus because I would get motion sickness,
so I had to have the front seat.
Interviewer: “So, did you spend the last part of one season with Racine?”
Yes
Interviewer: “Did they move you someplace else the next year? Then what
happened?” 30:00
Over the winter Racine moved to Battle Creek, Michigan, so I reported to Battle Creek
and I guess, maybe close to halfway through the season I was asked to go back to
Kalamazoo and I said, “that’s fine with me, you want me to play here, you want me to
play there, it doesn’t matter as long as I’m playing”, so I did, I went back to Kalamazoo.
The next three years I stayed with Kalamazoo.
10
�Interviewer: “Now, while you were with Kalamazoo the second time, did you now
get to start on a regular basis?”
Oh yes, I was right—the starting pitcher right from the beginning.
Interviewer: “What do you think was your best season?”
My best season was my third season, 1952. I pitched twenty-four consecutive complete
games.
Interviewer: “Did you have a sore arm or anything else like that?”
In the five years that I played, I never had a sore arm and never had any sores or
problems physically. 31:04
Interviewer: “Twenty-four complete games, I guess back then you had major
league pitchers who would do that kind of thing?”
They did the same thing back then, they pitched the complete games unless they had to
make a change, and today it’s just a six-inning game.
Interviewer: “You held-up that much longer. Did any of the teams you were with
manage to get to a championship game?”
Kalamazoo won the championship the last year, 1954.
Interviewer: “What do you remember about that season?”
That was a very good team. The last two years they had, they might have even started the
year before, they started bringing in some better ball players because two teams had
dropped out of the league, so there were some good ball players around and you could
pick-up good ball players and split them between the six teams that were left. We had
Dotty Schroeder, which was one of them, and I’m trying to think, Fern Schollenberger
played third base, I mean, these were girls that were excellent ball players. 32:10 Dotty
11
�Naum, she could pitch, she could play short stop, she was a catcher and she was just an
all around good ball player. Dotty Schroeder was another excellent short stop and when I
pitched against her in Fort Wayne I just admired the way she played and I was very
happy to have her on the Lassies, so that helped a lot.
Interviewer: “One of the things that characterized the league a little bit was that
you had some people that were really good base stealers. They could get on base,
now, what could you do to limit the damage? Did you have a pick-off move?”
Well, there again, I was fortunate—before I came out to my first tryouts in South Bend
there, three of my ball players from Staten Island were working out, two pitchers and a
catcher, and like I said, my brother showed me how to throw the pitches and then I was
just throwing the ball I wasn’t pitching. 33:14 The pitcher I’m going to talk about
showed me how to hold runners on base and how to—there were two ways a base stealer
could get a sign from you that he could go, and one was when you put your knee up off
the mound or broke your hands from the glove and he said you have to learn to do both of
them together because one or the other and their going to get a jump on you, so I learned
that and I was very successful at holding runners on. To say no one ever stole, because
they did, because we had some very good runners, but I learned that and he taught me
how to follow through on a pitch, which is probably why I never had a sore arm. His
name was George Bamberger who was the pitching coach for the Baltimore Orioles, was
successful and also became a major league manager. 34:06
Interviewer: “He managed the Brewers.”
The Brewers and the Mets.
12
�Interviewer: “You mentioned earlier something how you had gotten some pretty
good coaching before you went off to spring training. Was that what you were
talking about back there?”
Yes-- I couldn’t have gotten better coaching, for pitching anyway.
Interviewer: “So, did you have success at either picking runners off or holding
them on?”
Yeah, I had success at picking them off at first and I have to give my catcher the credit
because they had rifle arms and by me getting the ball to the plate quickly and them
having such good arms, we did throw a lot of good runners out.
Interviewer: “So, did they learn maybe not to try to steal against you quite as
much?”
Possibly
Interviewer: “Did you have much occasion to hit the ball?”
Well, we batted, and we didn’t have designated hitters, so we got up and I didn’t have a
great batting average. At one point in one season I was over three hundred and wow, it
was even printed in the paper, but it didn’t last too long. 35:16 I could hit a ball, but I
wasn’t a hitter. I could hit a lot of ground ball outs and I had my share of strikeouts, but I
wasn’t a total flop.
Interviewer: “Do you think that it helped you that you really learned to play just in
baseball rather than softball?”
Well, I learned softball first just playing in the streets and playing without gloves my
hands took a little beating once in a while, but I think it helped because you had to teach
yourself and learn as you went along.
13
�Interviewer: “But when you were playing with the boys, or whatever, was that
always softball or was there a point when they were playing regular baseball?”
Oh no, we played baseball and we would challenge other parts of the—of course there
were a lot of younger people my age on the island at the same time in the area where I
lived. It was very well populated and you could just go maybe two or three block and
challenge another team and that’s when I had to pitch for the boys because I had the
curve. 36:19
Interviewer: “when you played some of these other neighborhood teams, did any of
them have girls playing for them?”
No, when I see them now, or when I see them or when I seen “The League” when it first
came out, actually when the movie first came out I would meet them maybe in the street
or somewhere and they would tell me—especially one guy, he said he was so
embarrassed when I struck him out because he didn’t strikeout that much, but now he
says to his children and grandchildren, “she struck me out”. 36:55
Interviewer: “Now you played to the end—would you have kept playing if the
league had continued?”
Oh yes, I was just getting started at five years. I felt like I was just getting started and I
would have played a good maybe five, six, seven years. I figured I would have at least
that much.
Interviewer: “How much were they paying you then?”
Well, they started us out at fifty-five dollars a week and supposedly they had a maximum
of a hundred dollars a week and after my third season, that’s what I was making.
14
�Interviewer: “Now, was that pretty good money at that point? Better than you
might make if you were staying home with a job?”
I was making twenty-five dollars working forty hours a week in an office in Manhattan,
so fifty-five dollars was much better than that.
Interviewer: “Now, if you hadn’t had the chance to go play ball what do you think
you would have done in those years?”
I did work in the off-season. I worked back in the city, but that became a hassle too
because I had to take a bus from the island, a ferryboat, then the subway and the same
thing coming back home and that could be like three hours traveling a day, so I probably
would have looked for something right on Staten Island. 38:09 I did work in a
supermarket when I went back to Kalamazoo and I could have done different kinds of
job. I’ve worked in an office, I’ve worked in stores, and I would have found something.
Interviewer: “In the last couple of seasons there, did you have any indication that
the league was having trouble and that this might not go on forever?”
Actually no, I thought just that they might build it up again and get another team and
possibly build it up again. What was written in the paper about the league breaking was
that they were just going to take a year off and try to find new cities and if they could find
new cities it would be a novelty again in that city, and possibly draw enough people to
support it, but it just never came about, so that was just the end of it. There was no
discussion of any sort after that because they couldn’t find the cities. 39:08
Interviewer: “So, what did you do then once the league folded?”
I went back home and I worked in a store on the island and my brother was stationed in
Battle Creek and when he came home for the Christmas holidays that year with his wife,
15
�he told me that my good friend Dotty Naum got married and had a little baby. He said
she would like for me to come and stay with her for a while, so I did, I went back to
Battle Creek, I stayed with her because her husband was on the road a lot, and we use to
go into Kalamazoo once in a while to visit the ball players because a lot of the players
stayed in Kalamazoo and went to work there. Somebody said, “Why don’t you stay here
and play softball? We have so many girls from the league on the teams”, and I said,
“yeah, but I don’t have a job or anything”, and one girl said, “don’t worry, the sponsor
will give you a job”, and that’s when I went to work in his store. 40:17 I was there for
like a year and a half and I’d be getting calls from home like, “When are you coming
home?” Finally I said, “I better go”. I was just going to go visit for a little while and
eighteen months was a little more than that, so I went back home and I went back to work
in the city, and like I said before, it just was too much of a hassle.
Interviewer: “Then did you have a long term career or did you get married and
have a family? What did you do?”
I got married in 1959, so I didn’t have that long of a career. I did work a few years, until
I became pregnant and then I gave up the job and stayed home to be a stay at home mom.
Interviewer: “Where do you live now?”
I live on Staten Island.
Interviewer: “So, there are still some people there that you grew up with and you
played ball against and all that kind of thing?” 41:08
Oh yes
16
�Interviewer: “Because you kind of stayed in the same place and some of the people
were people you played ball with, did the people you knew, or worked with, did they
know that you played professional baseball?”
The people that I knew did and my sisters and brothers, if they had a friend and introduce
me, they would tell them that I played professional baseball, and they would say, “oh,
you played softball”, and my brother would say, “no, she played baseball”. They never
heard of a women’s baseball league, just like I didn’t until they came to Staten Island, but
it was hard for them to believe.
Interviewer: “While you were playing, did you see yourself, or the league, in kind of
way as kind of pioneering or doing something?”
No, I didn’t, not at that point. I was having fun and I was loving it, and I never saw
anything like that and I never expected what happened to be so big. 42:05
Interviewer: “As you kind of get into the seventies and the eighties and so forth, you
get Title IX coming in and you get more emphasis now on getting girls sports and
this kind of thing, did you pay attention to the news of that while it went on?”
Yeah, because I became a coach for the girls at the Staten Island Little League, and I
started with the ten to twelve age limit and then they had the senior girls and they would
graduate and play from thirteen to fifteen and I would go on to that. I was coaching girls
softball down at the little league for about twenty years.
Interviewer: “And if you look at it now do you think the league itself, did it play a
role, or set an example, or do we just realize now just how unusual it was?”
17
�We just realized since it’s taken off, like with the movie and everything, how important it
was. We, like I said, all of us were playing there because we loved the game and we
loved to play it. It was an opportunity, you know, that not too many people had. 43:15
Interviewer: “Did you get involved at all when they were making the movie and any
of the event surrounding that? Did you get to do any of those things?”
I did go out to Chicago when they had the actresses out there and we would—there would
be about sixty of us out there and someone would be taking in field practice and some
would be in the outfield and some would take batting practice and we did just a lot of
different things. Then I was asked to go to the Hall of Fame in Cooperstown when they
were there, and my husband just had a hip replaced and he couldn’t travel and I said, “I
just can’t leave him home alone”, so my neighbors were telling me to go ahead and they
would take care of him, but it’s not the same. 44:02
Interviewer: “Have you gone out to Cooperstown since then?”
Oh, I go back there every year.
Interviewer: “What did you think of the movie its self?”
Well, when they first told us who was going to be in the movie, especially Madonna, I
said, “What kind of a movie are you making here?” They said they wanted to make it a
comedy and they wanted to make it interesting because to make a movie about baseball
wasn’t going to be that interesting because there is just so much you can do. They
wanted to make it a comedy and they did a very good job doing that.
Interviewer: “Did you think that any of the actresses you were working with got
pretty good at what they were doing?”
18
�Yeah, some of them were pretty good when I met them in Chicago and they worked hard
at it, as a matter of fact, they told us they were picked for their athletic ability before they
were picked for acting, 44:52
Interviewer: “Rosie O’Donnell, Madonna? I don’t know.”
Well, not Madonna, but Rosie O’Donnell was a good athlete, and a couple of the others,
but Madonna was—she came and she wasn’t supposed to be in the movie, she was
supposed to do the background music, and she got caught up in all of it and she loved it.
Being a good friend of Penny Marshall, she said she wanted to be in the movie, so I
watched her try to catch and throw while we were out there and everybody’s calling
attention to her, “look at her, she’s trying to throw and she throws like”. She doesn’t
know how, but we found out she was a very good athlete in itself. She took very good
care of herself, but she just didn’t play ball, but she got someone to teach her and she got
a very good job out of it. 45:47
Interviewer: “When you think back over your professional playing career, are
there particular moments or events that kind of stand out in your memory, that
come back to you a lot?”
I just think of the people that we stayed with and the people in Kalamazoo like the family
I stayed with. The woman was a retired schoolteacher and the husband was still working
at one of the plants in Kalamazoo. They had two grown sons who were out of the house,
so that’s how they had the rooms, and we just got so close to them that, you know, we
visited them when they moved to Florida. They wanted to meet my mother, so I took my
mother to Florida to meet them. People in Kalamazoo were always having something for
the team, either some sort of a cook out or barbeque or stuff like that. They were always
19
�doing things for you. You couldn’t help but like the whole city and I’m sure that went on
in the other cities, also. 46:55
Interviewer: “If you look back on it now, how do you think your time in the
baseball league wound up affecting you? Did you learn things or grow? Did you
change at all because you had that experience?”
I’ll tell you, I got over my shyness. I was very shy and of course with ten siblings, you
could talk to them all, but it was—like in school it was difficult for me to get up and read
a book report or something like that and it helped in that respect.
Interviewer: “And do you think you learned things about people and dealing with
people different from yourself and that sort of thing?”
Oh sure, you learned that there are so many different types of people in different—I use
to make fun of the way the girls from the south talked and they use to make fun of me. I
said, “I don’t have an accent, you do”, but it was nice to meet people from all different
parts of the country. That was an education in its self.
Interviewer: “Anything else you would like to put on the record here before we
close out the interview?” 48:03
I can’t really think, I think we covered just about everything.
Interviewer: “You have a good story and you tell it well, so thank you very much
for coming in and sharing it today.”
You are very welcome, thank you.
20
�21
�
Dublin Core
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Title
A name given to the resource
All-American Girls Professional Baseball League Interviews
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Grand Valley State University. History Department
Description
An account of the resource
The All-American Girls Professional Baseball League was started by Philip Wrigley, owner of the Chicago Cubs, during World War II to fill the void left by the departure of most of the best male baseball players for military service. Players were recruited from across the country, and the league was successful enough to be able to continue on after the war. The league had teams based in Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana and Michigan, and operated between 1943 and 1954. The 1954 season ended with only the Fort Wayne, South Bend, Grand Rapids, Kalamazoo, and Rockford teams remaining. The League gave over 600 women athletes the opportunity to play professional baseball. Many of the players went on to successful careers, and the league itself provided an important precedent for later efforts to promote women's sports.
Source
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<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/484">All-American Girls Professional Baseball League Collection, (RHC-58)</a>
Rights
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<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Subject
The topic of the resource
Sports for women
World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American
All-American Girls Professional Baseball League--Personal narratives
Oral history
Baseball players--Minnesota
Baseball players--Indiana
Baseball players--Wisconsin
Baseball players--Michigan
Baseball players--Illinois
Baseball for women--United States
Publisher
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Grand Valley State University Libraries, Special Collections and University Archives, 1 Campus Drive, Allendale, MI, 49401
Identifier
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RHC-58
Format
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video/mp4
application/pdf
Type
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Moving Image
Text
Language
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eng
Date
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2017-10-02
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Smither, James
Boring, Frank
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Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Oral History
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RHC-58_GElliott
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Elliott, Gloria Cordes (Interview outline and video), 2007
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Elliott, Gloria Cordes
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Gloria Cordes Elliott was born in Staten Island, New York, in 1931. She grew up playing ball with her brothers, and first learned about the AAGPBL when they played an exhibition game on Staten Island in 1949. She tried out for the league before the game, and was invited to spring training the following year. She played as a pitcher for teams in Muskegon, Racine, Battle Creek and Kalamazoo, and at one point pitched twenty-four straight complete games.
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Boring, Frank (Interviewer)
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Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives
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Oral history
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Video recordings
All-American Girls Professional Baseball League--Personal narratives
Baseball for women--United States
Baseball
Sports for women
World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American
Baseball players--Michigan
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eng
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<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
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Moving Image
Text
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Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Date
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2007-08-20
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<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/484">All-American Girls Professional Baseball League Collection, (RHC-55)</a>
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application/pdf
video/mp4
-
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/6c0ecb4e240929a4129a026b5d02c2bd.mp4
5ef30b89d46c04d45c669a225ac95631
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/3ff904e9446c9a15be6e2a12408ddbcf.pdf
9a3ffb57f57a646746703a4efac33e95
PDF Text
Text
ORAL HISTORY INTERVIEW
Women in Baseball
Jean Faut
Born: East Greenville, Pennsylvania, 1925
Resides: Rocky Hill, South Carolina
Interviewed by: James Smither PhD, GVSU Veterans History Project, August10, 2010,
Detroit, MI at the All American Girls Professional Baseball League reunion.
Transcribed by: Joan Raymer, January 28, 2011
Interviewer: “Now Jean, can you start by telling us some background information.
Where and when were you born?”
I was born in 1925 in East Greenville, Pennsylvania and, of course, that was before the
Depression, but my father was a hunter and a fisherman so we did pretty good. This is
during the war and I graduated from high school in 1942 and of course the war started in
1941, and after graduation everybody had a war job and you couldn’t get any gas, so you
couldn’t do hardly anything. There were only two things to do, go swimming or play
ball, so I did both. We had a men’s semi-pro baseball team in our town and they
practiced two blocks from my house. 47:08 Of course, these are men that had a job in
the daytime and they practiced in the evening, so I would go down there and practice
with them. I started out shagging flies for batting practice and they realized I had a pretty
good arm, so they started letting me throw batting practice and then the second baseman
taught me all the pitches. Throwing overhand and the curves and the drops and the
screwballs and change of pace, and I went on a couple of exhibitions with their team.
That was when I was, oh lordy, fourteen, fifteen, something like that. 48:05 A few years
later, in fact I was twenty-one, and they had tryouts in Allentown, Pennsylvania for the
All American Girls league and I didn’t know anything about it , but I got a call, a
telephone call from a scout, in our home town, and wanted to know if I was interested in
1
�playing in a professional league. I didn’t know what he was talking about. I had never
heard of the league and it took me about ten seconds to say, “yes, I’m interested”, so we
arranged right on the spot. 49:08 he sent me a train ticket, this was in 1946 and the
league had started in 1943, but I had heard nothing about it, so I took this train ride and I
was going to Pascagoula, Mississippi. They were going to expand the league, two teams
I think. They had five hundred rookies come down there to try out for the league and
none of the veterans came until a week later. We took over the barracks of a naval base
and we played ball every day, we had a number on our back and it was fun and I survived
the week, the two weeks. 50:09 The veterans came and some older directors to decide
who they wanted, or if they wanted anybody. I was chosen by South Bend and that’s the
way I got into the league. We barnstormed up north, played every day on the way up by
the time the league started. The league started usually around May Day, it use to be May
Day, I don’t know, we don’t celebrate that anymore I don’t think. The league ended
around Labor Day.
Interviewer: “When you were trying out, were you trying out as a pitcher or did
they not let you pitch then?”
No specific position unless it would have been third base. I played the infield. I was
signed as a third baseman. 51:08
Interviewer: “When you were playing with the men, when you were playing back in
Pennsylvania, did you pitch in the games or did you just practice?”
No, we just—maybe I pitched a little at batting practice before the game started. I wasn’t
actually in the game, but it was only exhibition I guess you might call that.
Interviewer: “You did basically sign as a third baseman?”
2
�Yes
Interviewer: “You played third, ok.”
I don’t know that it said that on the contract.
Interviewer: “It might not have been, but when they sent you to play on a team, so
now you talked about barnstorming your way north. What kind of reception did
you get when you went to a town, what happened?” 52:01
Well, we usually just got there in time to go play the ball game and we’d be playing
against a competitive softball team. Actually, when I went to spring training tryout, I
thought they were playing baseball and I get there and they’re playing softball, fast pitch
softball, so I was surprised. We stopped at a city every day and played a game against
some local team and they played our rules as far as the distance of the pitching and so
forth.
Interviewer: “The game you were playing was sort of in between traditional softball
and men‟s baseball?” 53:08
Yes, you could steal—you could take a lead off first. I don’t know what else was
different, but I had a good time I’ll tell you. It was fun.
Interviewer: “Which team did they send you to?”
South Bend Blue Sox and I played with them my whole career.
Interviewer: “How long was your career?”
Eight years
Interviewer: “Do you remember your first game when you played for the Blue
Sox?”
3
�My first home game for the season, I really can’t remember that far back, but you know, I
had never played on a team, softball or baseball, so playing as a team mate was
something new to me, so I had to learn a little bit about that as far as batting signals and
stuff like that. 54:16
Interviewer: “How well did you do that first year? Did you play well”
Yes, I think I did. I had a very strong arm and I think that’s why they put me at third
base. I was always very competitive all my life and I played all sport in high school and
also, the All American Games that were scheduled for South American in Rio de Janeiro
we were going to, and then the war broke out. 55:12 I was scheduled to go with that
team as a high jumper and of course, that was cancelled because of the war.
Interviewer: “The Pan American Games do you think?”
Yes
Interviewer: “The Pan Am Games, right, ok. So, you really were an athlete?”
Yes I was
Interviewer: “In a lot of ways.”
I played basketball, field hockey that was my favorite because it was a little rougher than
the other games.
Interviewer: “All right, in baseball were you a good hitter? Could you hit well?”
Well, the first year I didn’t hit well because I had a sprained thumb the whole year, but
after that I did and one year I had the highest average in the league, but I didn’t have
enough games in to qualify as the highest hitter, but since I was a pitcher, well that year I
was a pitcher. 56:16
Interviewer: “When did you start to pitch in the games?”
4
�Well, when the league introduced a live ball they moved the distances, the pitching
distance and the base paths. Everything got moved back and that’s when they went from
underhand pitching to sidearm, they use to call it, then I started pitching. When they
really went to complete overhand pitching, I was home free. I knew all the pitches and
they had a lot of trouble hitting off me and I used to—I played for Dave Bancroft one
year, he managed our team a couple years and he would have a team meeting before
every game and we would discuss the good hitters and their weaknesses and stuff like
that. 57:29 I was a mathematical whiz in school and I got to where I could remember the
rotation that I pitched to the best hitters and then I always changed it the next time they
came up to bat, so there were little crazy things like that I use to do that gave me a little
edge. 57:58
Interviewer: “Now, did you call your own pitches or did your catcher call the
pitches?”
The catcher called the pitches, but if I didn’t think it was right I shook it off and we did
something else.
Interviewer: “Did you have a particular player that was your catcher most of the
time or did they change every year?”
No, I also played for, I think it was Dave Bancroft, but one of the managers asked me
who I wanted catching for me and I chose Shirley Stovroff. She had a very good arm and
could throw it to second and possible get the runner from trying to steal, so she was my
main catcher. 58:54
5
�Interviewer: “Now, would you try to pick off the runners? In modern baseball
pitchers have pickoff moves, they try to thow out the runner themselves. Would you
do that, or would you do things to keep them close to the base?”
Well, I always had my eye on them and I would try to pick them off, yeah.
Interviewer: “Did you have one season as a pitcher that you thought was
particularly good? What was your best season do you think?”
Well, that would have been 1952. I had twenty-two wins and two losses, or it was twenty
wins and two losses. 59:58 That was my best year and—I had a friend and after I
stopped playing baseball I—you know you never lose your competitive spirit and it really
works on you, you need to do something. I went bowling, I went to a bowling center and
I went out on the bowling tour for quite a few years and there I met some of the ball
players, so this one gal, Jean Havlish, she played for Kenosha in the league, she told me
the gals would ask about my pitching, and she told them that their manager, every time
they knew I was pitching, he would call a special batting practice to get ready for me.
1:02 Then they said, “After you had the batting practice, did you hit her?” I’m not going
to say the right word, but she said, “heck no, we couldn’t hit her at all”, so I’m just
referring to how they felt about the pitching. 1:27
Interviewer: “Well, when we interview other players, who played when you did and
we ask them who the best players were or who was the pitcher you didn‟t want to
see, your name comes up a lot. Now, did you throw a no hitter in your career?”
I had quite a few no hitters, but my biggest accomplishment was, I pitched two perfect
games, but you have to remember, I had a good team behind me. 2:03
6
�Interviewer: “So you had good defensive players?”
Yes
Interviewer: “Who do you think were the best players you played with? Who were
the best people on your team?”
On our team?
Interviewer: “Yes”
Well, Betsy Jochum was good. She just played a few years after I started and Liz Mahon,
she was very good. I can’t really pick them out because they were all so good. Betty
Wagner was a great outfielder and then she started pitching and was picking them off at
first.
Interviewer: “A left hander, yeah, will do that. 3:00 Tell me a little bit about some
of the spring training. You mentioned going down to Pascagoula one year, did you
make the trip to Cuba?”
Yes I did
Interviewer: “Tell me about that year.”
Well, of course the Brooklyn Dodgers were there because of Jackie Robinson and they
left the day before we flew in. When we had spring training the whole league would train
together, it was not an individual team. According to the reports, they were waiting for
the girls and we packed the stands every night. They loved to watch us play and practice.
4:00 In the games they would be walking around in the stands with a roll of money,
making bets. Cuba was either—either you were very rich or you were poor and we
stayed in a hotel that was right at the harbor and Morro Castle was right across the water
and we would have breakfast down on the first floor, right inside windows that were wide
7
�open. These women use to come with their—carrying a little child kind of looking for a
handout and we’d hand them some milk or something and then they would drink it and
not give it to the child, but those are just some of the things I remember about it. 5:00
One thing I do remember is I was on the sixth floor, It was the Strat—I can’t remember
right now, but my room was on the sixth floor and we were not allowed to take the
elevators, so I’m crawling up the steps, six flights, because during spring training the
back of your legs gets so sore and I had no trouble losing twenty pounds in two weeks
and in spring training it was just automatic because that’s all you did is play ball and get
lots of exercise. The people were very, very interested in the girls and the league picked
up nine Cuban girls to play in our league. 5:57
Interviewer: “All right, why wouldn‟t they let you use the elevator?”
Because you’re in spring training and you’re supposed to walk. They always wanted us
to do it the hard way.
Interviewer: “When you were in Cuba, did they have any special events for you?
Did you do anything other than just play ball?”
We just played ball, we really didn’t have any special events. That was in 1947 and after
that season was over we went back on a tour and we didn’t have all those rules. Then we
did all kinds of things, we went to the beach and we walked the streets.
Interviewer: “Where did you go on the tour?”
We went to Havana for a week and then there was some kind of problem with the
contracts with the cities and then we went home, but later on they finished the tour. 7:13
They went to—I didn’t go back the next time. They went to cities in South America and
Central America and they ended up in Mexico City.
8
�Interviewer: “That was the Central American tour.”
Yes
Interviewer: “When you came into the league, what kinds of rules and regulations
did they have for the players? Did you have to do everything they did in the movie
or not all of that stuff?”
Well, first of all we lived in private homes, so we really didn’t have transportation. A
typical day was to get up and have breakfast and be at practice at ten o’clock and you
practiced until noon. 8:12 Then you go home and try to get some rest because you have
to be back on the field by five o’clock. We played all night games, double headers on
Sundays and holidays, so if you had a double header it’s late and if you’re lucky to find
something open, you get something to eat before you go back home and go to sleep and
do that thing all over again. I mean, baseball, if you play, you sign a professional
contract and that’s what you do, you play baseball and you don’t have time to do
anything else. 9:01
Interviewer: “What about when you were on the road? How did that work?”
We stayed in hotels then and traveled by bus and sometimes long bus trips. I played for
South Bend and there were teams in Wisconsin and it would probably take us six hours
to get there, but once you’re there—you’re on the road for two weeks when you go on the
road and then you’re home for two weeks and then you’re back on the road for two
weeks, but you didn’t have that practice session in there. I don’t remember practicing in
the daytime when we were on the road because we’d had a long bus ride or something.
10:02 But, we had rules; you had to be in your room by a certain time. Whether
anybody broke those rules I don’t know. I was a baseball person. I wasn’t interested in
9
�going someplace and have a couple beers or something like that, but I know some of
them did and that’s what the chaperone was for. We had chaperones that kept a record of
who was in what room and we’d have bed check to make sure you’re in there when you
should be.
Interviewer: “Did you like the chaperones? Did the chaperones do a good job?”
They carried the first aid kit around. 11:02 They did make arrangements for people if
they had a problem you know. Some of the girls came in very young and she sort of had
somebody keep an eye on them and help them along and if somebody got hurt, of course ,
she helped with the problem.
Interviewer: “You were a little bit older than some of them.”
Yeah, I was twenty-one when I started.
Interviewer: “You were talking about playing every day and playing double
headers. When you had a double header, would you play both games?”
When I played third base I played both games, but as a pitcher I never played two games.
I guess some pitchers did, but I didn’t. 12:01
Interviewer: “Did the Blue Sox ever win a championship while you were playing
with them?”
Yeah, we won the championship two years. I believe it was 1951 and 1953.
Interviewer: “In 1953 Grand Rapids won.”
It must have been 1952 then. I don’t remember, but we won it twice.
Interviewer: “Do you remember anything about pitching in those championship
series? Does that standout in your mind at all or were those just other games?”
10
�Well, the one that really stand out is, one year we had some players quit like a week
before the playoffs, so here we are now with twelve players and everybody gave us up,
but somehow your competitive spirit makes you fight a little harder and get more
determined. 13:25 I can remember, I pitched three games in that series and the final
game was up at a strange field because it had run late and was supposed to be in
Rockford, Illinois, but there was something scheduled, so we had to go to a strange field
and it had no fence, so we hit very well
Interviewer: “We were talking about one of your championship seasons when you
team was short handed. You pitched three games, was that a seven game series or
did it go seven games? Five or six?”
I think so. 14:22
Interviewer: “Were the games every day?”
Oh yeah, but getting back—the third game I pitched, we went to this strange field and
didn’t have—we had rules on how far the fences could be or they had to be so far, so that
was out of the picture because there were no fences, so we got—we hit quite a few
triples. The last one, the last time I was at bat I could have made a home run. I stopped
between third and home, I was so tired, I went back and sat on third base. 15:15 That’s
how tired I was. I was playing every day and that long in the season and by the time the
season ends, you know you’ve had a strenuous summer, but we loved it anyway.
Interviewer: “What would you do in the off season? You play the game and do you
go work somewhere?”
Well, I always had a job. I was working for the U.S. Rubber Co. in Mishawaka, Indiana
and I had several jobs off-season.
11
�Interviewer: “But around South Bend, you didn‟t go back to Pennsylvania or
anything like that?”
No I didn’t and by that time I had married and had a son. 16:23
Interviewer: “Now, that was a little bit unusual for the players and you don‟t have
to talk about your personal life more than you feel like it. You were married to
someone who was your manager at some point, right?”
Well, he became manager and I wasn’t very happy about that because it did cause
problems, but it didn’t change my life any. I mean as far as—I still played ball, but I had
a lot of responsibility other than playing ball.
Interviewer: “Now, you had a child in the middle of your baseball career. Were
you playing while you were pregnant, or did you stop, what did you do?” 17:12
Well, I didn’t play until—I missed part of a season after I had Larry. I had a woman take
care of him when we went on the road and then she took care of him during home games,
so it probably wasn’t fair to my son, but how do you do that? I mean, you do what you
have to do and when he was about five, no it couldn’t have been that-- yeah, the last year
he was five and he went on the bus with us. 18:23 I think he only did that one year, I
can’t remember, maybe it was two years. That was kind of a convenient thing, I mean it
was nice to have him with me.
Interviewer: “When people watch the movie, “A League of Their Own”, one of the
things they notice is there‟s a player who has her son with her and that kind of thing
and people think—“
That was not my son. That was the son of the center fielder for Grand Rapids.
Interviewer: “Ah”
12
�People ask me if my son was the brat in the movie and I always tell them, “no way”.
Interviewer: “But, such things did occasionally happen. Some of the other things in
the movie didn‟t ever happen, but this one sometimes did. 19:17 Now, over the
course of the time that you were in the league, you talked a little bit about some of
the changes that took place. They changed the distances in the base path; they got
closer and closer to the men‟s game. Now, the other thing that happened was the
league began to lose some of its popularity. Did you notice that in the last couple
years you were playing?”
Oh yes, but see, I was never involved in the business end of it and I knew—well, the boys
were coming home from the service and the boys were buying cars, taking trips, and so
the attendance went down and at the same time television came along. 20:23 Actually, I
always felt like they should have promoted that end of it and it might have survived the
problem and the reason—when the service men came home and bought the cars, that’s
when they started building motels and people started traveling, so our game attendance
was affected by people starting to travel, but we had very, very enthusiastic fans and in
fact, some of them would drive to away games. I don’t know where they got the gas, but
they got it. 21:14
Interviewer: “After the end of WWII, things eventually loosened up, so it was a
little easier to get gas maybe in 1949 than in 1946 or something. What kind of
relationship did the team have with the town of South Bend? Did a lot of people in
South Bend support the team or promote it?”
Oh yes, yes, the first manager I had was Chet Grant and he was not a baseball man, he
was a football player from Notre Dame and in fact he was quarterback of Notre Dame
13
�when they introduced the pass, so that’s going way back. He graduated from Notre
Dame and he was a journalist and he always said, when he was talking about the league,
“You have to see it to believe it and then you still didn’t believe it”. He always said that
in his—he was famous for saying that about the girls. 22:24
Interviewer: “Do you know why you had a football player for a manager? How he
got that job?”
I have no idea, I have no idea, I liked him.
Interviewer: “Was he good at coaching? Would he help teach the players how to
play or did he not do that?”
I don’t think he did too much teaching, but as far as teamwork and so forth, I thought he
was good. Of course, he was my first manager and anything was great in those days.
Interviewer: “When they signed you, how much did they pay you? What was your
salary?”
I started at fifty-five dollars a week.
Interviewer: “What did you get up to?” 23:15
A hundred and twenty-five a week and besides that, when I started playing they were
paying meal money on the road. We got six dollars a day for food and in those days you
could eat for six dollars a day. You don’t have time to go shopping and I sent my mother
fifty dollars a week home to start a bank account and that was a lot of money in those
days.
Interviewer: “Yes it was”
14
�Financially it was great and it was wonderful for the girls to go to college. The timing
was right and a lot of them did go to college and get professional jobs after they
graduated from college. 24:19
Interviewer: “If you hadn‟t gone to play baseball, what do you think you would
have done?”
If I hadn’t gone to play baseball? I would have ended up in college and somehow or
other I would have gone. I was a honor student, but we had no money, so the baseball
career was great for myself and my family.
Interviewer: “Now, you quit the league before it ended. You went through 1953
and then you stopped?”
Well, if you recall, I married the manager and it caused problems and eventually it just
didn’t get to be fun for me anymore, so I thought—I always felt that when it’s not fun
anymore, I’m going to stop and that’s what I did. 25:28
Interviewer: “Did you go to college after that? What did you do after you left the
team?”
I had some pretty good jobs and the one I like the best—I was hired as administrative
secretary of mosquito biology training program at the University of Notre Dame financed
by the National Institute of Health. It was a five year program and I ran it, I worked for
five professors and it was extremely interesting. 26:19 Notre Dame is the mosquito
center of the world and they maintain all species from all over the world, so most of the
students that entered the program were graduates form foreign countries, eighty percent
of them were foreign. My main job was to computerize all the research that had been
done on mosquitoes up to date. If somebody wanted to study a certain species that
15
�carried a certain disease, they would write to me and I would print up everything that had
ever been done on that disease or that mosquito species. I would get that printed out and
send them. 27:36 We maintained the eggs in the laboratories, in the freezer. You put
the eggs on the paper toweling and put it in the freezer and you can keep them forever
and all you have to do if you’re going to hatch them is to put them in water and they’ll
hatch. I would send them these eggs and the printout and they would write back and
thank me for doing six months of their research for them. 28.14 I loved that program, it
was a five year program and when Richard Nixon became president, he cancelled all
training programs throughout the country, so there went my job. From there I went to
Miles Laboratories and worked in the research there.
Interviewer: “All right, when you look back over your baseball career, how do you
think that affected you? You said a little bit about that, but do you think it changed
you or you gained something from it?”
Oh yes, it was a wonderful experience and you got to meet a lot of people and make
friends with a lot of new people. You’re exposed to a lot and when you apply for jobs
they respect the fact that you were a professional and I really, really loved the
experiences. 29:42 And it was probably the best eight years of my life.
Interviewer: “After you finished playing, people did know that you were a ball
player because a lot of the players never talked about it?”
No, I just—when you apply for jobs you have to put down what you’ve been doing and
your education and stuff like that.
16
�Interviewer: “I guess in that area there would have been people around South Bend
who remembered, „Ok, that‟s the Blue Sox”, and they would know that, at least that
generation would know that.” 30:21
I did some crazy things in the off-season to try to keep in shape. I remember shoveling
snow for this one store, so people could park and stuff and they always asked the owner,
“Why do you have that girl out there shoveling snow?” He would have to tell them that
she wanted the exercise. I did little crazy things like that.
Interviewer: “At the time you were playing, did you see yourself as being any kind
of a pioneer or this league as starting anything important or were you just playing
ball?”
Could you repeat that question?
Interviewer: “Today we look at the league as being pioneers and kind of the first
women to go and do this kind of thing. Did you think of that at all while you were
playing?”
No, never, we were having a good time and a lot of them said they would have done it for
nothing, but the money was nice. 31:34 People who have jobs and they don’t like their
job, I mean, I feel sorry for them because it’s your life and if you don’t like your job,
you’re depressed, so to do something that you really love to do is a great way to live.
Interviewer: “And it certainly makes for a good story, so I would just like to thank
you for coming and telling it to me today.”
Thank you for having me. 32:13
17
�18
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Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
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All-American Girls Professional Baseball League Interviews
Creator
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Grand Valley State University. History Department
Description
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The All-American Girls Professional Baseball League was started by Philip Wrigley, owner of the Chicago Cubs, during World War II to fill the void left by the departure of most of the best male baseball players for military service. Players were recruited from across the country, and the league was successful enough to be able to continue on after the war. The league had teams based in Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana and Michigan, and operated between 1943 and 1954. The 1954 season ended with only the Fort Wayne, South Bend, Grand Rapids, Kalamazoo, and Rockford teams remaining. The League gave over 600 women athletes the opportunity to play professional baseball. Many of the players went on to successful careers, and the league itself provided an important precedent for later efforts to promote women's sports.
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<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/484">All-American Girls Professional Baseball League Collection, (RHC-58)</a>
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<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
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Sports for women
World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American
All-American Girls Professional Baseball League--Personal narratives
Oral history
Baseball players--Minnesota
Baseball players--Indiana
Baseball players--Wisconsin
Baseball players--Michigan
Baseball players--Illinois
Baseball for women--United States
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Grand Valley State University Libraries, Special Collections and University Archives, 1 Campus Drive, Allendale, MI, 49401
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RHC-58
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video/mp4
application/pdf
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Text
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eng
Date
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2017-10-02
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Smither, James
Boring, Frank
Relation
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Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Oral History
A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge.
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RHC-58_JFaut
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Faut, Jean (Interview transcript and video), 2010
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Faut, Jean
Description
An account of the resource
Jean Faut was born in East Greenville, Pennsylvania, in 1925. As a teenager, she shagged flies and pitched batting practice for a men's semipro team, and was spotted by an AAGPBL scout and recruited into the league. She played from 1946 through 1953 for the South Bend Blue Sox. She was initially signed as a third baseman, but had such a good arm that she was converted to a pitcher, and became one of the most dominant pitchers in the league. She threw several no-hitters and two perfect games, and helped her team to win two championships. She was married and had a son while she was in the league, and when he was old enough, he came with her on road trips
Contributor
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Smither, James (Interviewer)
Publisher
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Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives
Subject
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Oral history
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Video recordings
All-American Girls Professional Baseball League--Personal narratives
Baseball for women--United States
Baseball
Sports for women
World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American
Baseball players--Indiana
Language
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eng
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<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
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Moving Image
Text
Relation
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Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Date
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2010-08-06
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/484">All-American Girls Professional Baseball League Collection, (RHC-55)</a>
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application/pdf
video/mp4
-
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/5092a94e7a78b7c270892bde9e9df49f.m4v
f07ec4764b9b29a611f08f1982cfb6d0
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/6531d57d37a35878d16b558e3f012b62.pdf
a6e927403c9beeae56794767a3c57154
PDF Text
Text
ORAL HISTORY INTERVIEW
HELEN FILARSKI
Women in Baseball
Born: 1924 Detroit, MI
Resides:
Interviewed by: Frank Boring, GVSU Veterans History Project, August 5, 2010, Detroit,
Michigan at the All American Girls Professional Baseball League reunion.
Transcribed by: Joan Raymer, November 26, 2010
Interviewer: “Helen, if we could begin with your full name and where and when
were you born?”
My whole name is Helen Margaret Filarski and I was born in 1924.
Interviewer: “Where?”
In Detroit, Michigan
Interviewer: “What was your early childhood like? Where did you live?”
I lived in Detroit, Michigan and most of the time it was—the war was on and there was
no—it was before the war was on I should say and I was going to school in Detroit, the
Catholic school. 14:17
Interviewer: “Did you wear a uniform?”
No, not at first, it’s when you’re out of the eighth grade that you start with the uniform.
Interviewer: “I had the white sox with the black shoes and the girls had the skirts
with the white sox, yup, yup. Where did you live? I know it was Detroit, but did
you live in an apartment or a house?”
No, we lived in the east side of Detroit and my mother and father and there were seven
children. The war was on and most of them at that time were in war plants because the
war was on and everything, so we just stayed there and I went to Holy Name School for
1
�eight years and graduated from there and went to St. Joseph’s because my mother had
gone there, so we all followed up in the Polish atmosphere. 15:46
Interviewer: “So you had neighborhood friends and did you play games?”
Played games—I was one of seven children, so the girls, I didn’t consider myself a girl
because I went with my brother and we played ball all the time. The boys got away with
it you know, so I stuck with him and we played ball and most of my time with them we
played and like everybody else, we had one bat and one ball and I got the job to sew the
ball up every time after we played because we knocked the stuffing out of it, but then we
had to sew it up before we could play a game. 16:41 I would keep that up and I went
through grade school and I played all that way and then I went to high school.
Interviewer: “Now, were there any organized sports at the school?”
No, not at grade school they didn’t have any.
Interviewer: “But you’re playing baseball basically with other neighbor kids?”
We would get out of school and out we would go. We lived right next to a playground
and that was one thing you know, we would go out the door and over the street and we
played until it got dark and that was it every day you know. 17:34 Because I was a girl,
my mother would call me every once in a while, “get in here and do the dishes”, and I
didn’t enjoy that, but what do you do? We did that all my life through eighth grade then
when I graduated out of grade school—oh, in the summer time my mother, since we were
so poor and they didn’t have a job, my father got a job cleaning the streets at that time
because there wasn’t any war plants. My mother would make a big lunch and everything
and my dad would drive out to a plot that the city gave you and make a garden and we
would sit out there all day working on the planting. 18:40 Then my dad would come
2
�back after he got through with his job and pick us up. There were about four of us at that
time that went there and they took us home and we got ready for dinner and everything
and that was every day, you know, that we had time to get over there.
Interviewer: “By the time you got into high school, did you have any idea what you
wanted to do through life? Were you going to be a nurse or be a mother, what were
you thinking?”
Well, through those years I played ball at the city park and I played with the girls that
were in the league and mostly I was too young and that and I would pick-up the bats and
chase the ball and stuff like that. 19:43
Interviewer: “So is this the actual professional girls’ baseball league?”
Yes
Interviewer: “How did you hear about them?”
Oh, I learned a lot from them you know.
Interviewer: “But how did you hear about them? How did you know they were
there?”
Here’s the playground, here’s the street, here’s my house, I mean we lived right upon it
and anybody that would get on that field we could see and if there was an open space, a
position open, I ran over there and played in it, the boys or whoever is playing.
Interviewer: “How did you hear about the All American Girls Professional Baseball
League though?”
Alright, when we played, a bunch of girls were in the league and I got good enough to
play with them and on their team, so I played and everybody said, “why don’t you go join
us for this year, you’re good enough to go over there”. 20:52
3
�Interviewer: “So they were off season, they were from Detroit and they went to
play wherever they played and when they came back, that’s when you were playing
with them?”
Yes
Interviewer: “Ok, now I get it, so did you go and talk to your mom and dad about
it?’
Oh, I kept talking to her all the time, but it was no use and she would say, “girls don’t
play ball, just come in the house and do some work around the house”, all housework all
the time.
Interviewer: “You had told me a story about how you heard about tryouts in
Chicago, let’s hear that story.”
Through the girls, we kept going to the park and that and I heard the story about it and the
girls kept asking me, “come on, come on with us, don’t stay here”, so I went and asked
my mother and she said, “you’re too young, you can’t leave home alone, you’re too
young to go”, and she said, “Al Capone is in here and he’s trying to get a league together
of women and it’s not for playing ball and you’re not going anywhere near that
playground again”, so it just kept a going and I kept playing there. 22:27 I kept playing
until I got out of high school.
Interviewer: “So you had to have her permission to be able to join the league and
she wouldn’t let you.”
No
Interviewer: “So when you turned was it eighteen? What did you do?”
4
�Eighteen, yes and I said, “I’ll run away”, and she didn’t like the idea of me running away,
so she said, “let me talk to some of the girls, Connie Wisnwiewski, and a lot of the girls
that were on the team and they were my friends and I had them over and everything and
she talked to them and they said, “she’ll be all right, we’ll take care of her”, and I was
about the youngest one there then and when I got to spring training they got me in real
good you know. “You Polock, you go and stay in the room and when we call you bring
down the fire escape and bring us in”, so that’s what I was doing for a while. 23:40 I
was the best friend.
Interviewer: “So your mom finally says it’s ok to go. What does your dad think
about all this?”
My dad didn’t care. Hhe didn’t care.
Interviewer: “So, how did you actually go to the spring training? Did you go by
train, did you go by bus?”
We did, we went by train.
Interviewer: “And you were with the other girls that you knew, so you felt kind of
taken care of?”
Yes, placing you where you were going to play, I got on a team, Rockford, with no
friends of mine and I didn’t know anybody.
Interviewer: “Did you have to try out? Did you have to try out for the team?”
Yes
Interviewer: “What was that experience? What was that like, the tryouts?”
You’re scared, you’re scared and there were girls from the league out there and they
would hit the ball to me. Connie Wisnwiewski was the best pitcher there was at the time,
5
�so she would do the pitching—running and everything, teaching you, but they made a
fool of me. 25:04 They’ll do that, they will kid around with ya, but I tried to do it my
own same way.
Interviewer: “But you got in.”
Oh yeah, I got in
Interviewer: “That must have been a happy day?”
Oh, it was fine, but it took me and got me into a house. When you get on a team they
check you into a house, so this was mom and dad Gorenson and they had no children and
they had a beautiful home and everything, but they said to them, “keep an eye on her
because she’s underage and we don’t want any problems”, so it was “where you going?”
They kept their eye on me. 25:57
Interviewer: “Did you have a room mate?”
Yes, she was a movie star, Kay Rohrer, and she would go out and she would say, “don’t
forget, I will call you when I want to come back in”, so she would call and if we were on
the road, she would call and I’d let down the fire escape otherwise I would wait and put
the light on so she would see the light and that the road was clear and she would come in
and we did that for two seasons.
Interviewer: “What was your first season like as a rookie?” 26:36
Scared, you’re really scared when you play with these gals who know their position and
what’s going on instead of waiting for someone to say, “now you go there and you go
there”. They put you in your position and they taught you—you learned and you would
stay on that field until you fell down. You learned to not be afraid of the ball and it was
good, it was really great. 27:12
6
�Interviewer: “What position did you play the first season?”
Third base
Interviewer: “As a rookie, did you start or did you sit on the bench a lot?”
No, I started I started.
Interviewer: “Even though you were scared, you must have been pretty good?”
I didn’t mind it and I was tough you know, I would run and go after that ball because I
was going to stop it if it killed me. When you were a rookie, you were going to fight
your heart out and that’s what I did and it was a strong team.
Interviewer: “Any particular game that you remember from the first season? Was
there anything that you did that was good or maybe made a mistake?” 28:03
I don’t know, I’m telling you; I ended up in the hospital.
Interviewer: “What happened?”
Well, I got spiked a couple of times down my legs sliding into third base you know and I
think that’s what the worst one was, but that was it.
Interviewer: “How did you like the uniform?”
Oh, it was free you know and they gave you a lot of free time there.
Interviewer: “Did you have to alter it at all for your height or anything?”
The first year no, but the second year we did because it was a little bit long.
Interviewer: “One of the girls said the difficulty was that she played in the outfield
and as you reached down for the ball, you got dress and you didn’t get the ball you
got the skirt.”
Right, it’s just like in the infield, you’re down here and you go down for the ball and
here—the ball is right there. 29:14
7
�Interviewer: “Now, once you finished your first season, you came back home to
Detroit?”
Oh yeah
Interviewer: “Then what did you do when you got home? Were you still in school?
You were out of school, right?”
No, no I wasn’t in school, but in-between there I went to the war factory. I was two years
in the war factory and then I was able to—my age could get me out you know, so that’s
where I went.
Interviewer: “You were in Detroit though?”
Yes
Interviewer: “So that was one of the factories that was supporting the war.”
Yes
Interviewer: “So then how did you—your second season, did they send you a letter?
Did they call up your house and say we want a new contract?”
Yeah, they send a letter and tell you it’s—we met in spring training.
Interviewer: “Ok, and once again you took the train?” 30:12
Yes
Interviewer: “Did you still travel with the same girls that you did before?”
Oh yeah, there were about seven or eight of us from Detroit that—and every year they
probably picked up on or two girls, so it got big and it was very nice.
Interviewer: “So the second year you weren’t a rookie any more?”
No, no and boy, you better know your steps. It was great and you just knew what you
were doing.
8
�Interviewer: “How were the fans?”
Oh, the fans just loved ya I’m telling ya. They would be in there and we had a lot of
attendance. They were there all the time. It was great.
Interviewer: “Now you played some games at home and then you also had road
trips?”
Yes, four games at home one time and three on the road and then three home and four on
the road.
Interviewer: “What were the road trips like?”
Bumpy, we just had a beat-up bus and oh my god I’m telling you it was really something.
It was worse than these that go down the street. 31:34
Interviewer: “These were fairly long trips by bus?”
A lot of them, like you would go to Chicago, that was a long one from Peoria or
something like that. That was about the longest one I think, from Peoria over into
Chicago there.
Interviewer: “Now, when you stopped along the way were you just able to walk out
with in your blue jeans?”
No, if you stopped there and you intended to get off the bus you gotta put your skirt on.
You couldn’t be seen in public in shorts or anything like that. 32:16
Interviewer: “Right, did you have to go through the charm school, the school?”
Ya, it was the first year the charm school was there.
Interviewer: “I’m sorry, I should have gotten back—how was that?”
9
�Oh, everybody laughed about it at first. They made us scared you know, because we
couldn’t get out there and play ball because we were doing this and everything you know,
and what did we want to do that for.
Interviewer: “Did you have to have a book on your head?”
No, but some did
Interviewer: “Well, did they ask you to sit down in a certain way? Did you also
learn how to use the knife and fork and things like that?”
Well, your woman who taught us-Interviewer: “Helena Rubenstein?” 33:27
Yeah, she was one, and they taught us how to get up and how to sit down and some of
them would just mock them and come in and plop down.
Interviewer: “But this was new to you, you were a city girl, right and playing with
the boys and now you got to sit this way?”
Yes, and I was scared and you would get scared at doing these things, but I loved it just
as much.
Interviewer: “Did any of those things carry on for the rest of your life? Do you still
sit that way?”
No, no and if I want to sit down, I sit down. 34:17
Interviewer: “So, your second season, you’re not a rookie anymore and you’re still
playing third base?”
Yes
Interviewer: “Any games that you can think of that were a little bit unusual and did
you have a good year?”
10
�Oh, we had a good year, we won the championship the first year that I played and that
was good.
Interviewer: “Because of you?”
No, I helped a little bit and I had a good year there and if I couldn’t do it with my glove, I
would do it with my body.
Interviewer: “You said earlier that your family was not wealthy and you were
making pretty good money weren’t you?”
Yeah, it was more than I did in the factory. I mean we were still at the war a couple more
years I think into it and we were still at war.
Interviewer: “Did you send money home?” 35:20
Yeah, oh yeah I sent it and I didn’t have anyplace to spend it because you can’t do
anything anyway.
Interviewer: “At that time Helen, you’re a professional baseball player and
whether your mother believed it or not, you really were a professional baseball
player. Were you thinking that was something you were going to keep doing every
year?”
Well, I didn’t hear about it at first, but I wanted to get into it and once I got into it I loved
it you know.
Interviewer: “But did you think you were going to be able to play this for a
number of years?”
No, I would just do it day by day and figure it out just as good as you can and you do
what you can.
11
�Interviewer: “Did you have any idea what you wanted to do professionally with
your life? Did you want to become a nurse or did you want to become anything?”
No, I just wanted to play ball all day long. 36:31
Interviewer: “So, at the end of the second season you came back to Detroit and you
worked in the same factory?”
No, you couldn’t go back there.
Interviewer: “So, did you get a job?”
No, I don’t think I did.
Interviewer: “You were living at home with mom and dad?”
Yeah, and working around there.
Interviewer: “Now the third season comes along and you’re not playing for the
same team anymore, right?”
Let me see, I went to Peoria and Kenosha for one year after that and then went to South
Bend for three years.
Interviewer: “But the Kenosha experience—how come they transferred you to
Kenosha? Do you remember why?” 37:29
Well, they probably had an opening. Either somebody got hurt or you never know if they
didn’t have a good player there.
Interviewer: “So, you’re playing with one team and the next thing you know you’re
playing with another team.”
That’s right, you can go overnight, a lot of times you play ball that night and then as soon
as you start packing in the dressing room and out you go to another city. That’s how they
went when they were short on players.
12
�Interviewer: “Was the experience at Kenosha a good one?”
Oh yeah, it was a good one, getting use to the girl next to you, you know, it takes a little
time, so they make you play a little longer and you get different plays and it works out
good, so I stayed there for that year. 38:37
Interviewer: “Good, then back again to Detroit?”
Yes
Interviewer: “And then you play another year?”
Yeah
Interviewer: “This time you’re with the new team, South Bend and they had a
pretty good team didn’t they?”
Oh yes, they did and three years I played with them and they were very good. They had a
lot of old time ball players. I mean they didn’t get any new ones like the other teams got
and it’s hard to get use to playing next to somebody like that, going after the ball or
playing to the right team. 39:38
Interviewer: “Now, you’re playing for a number of years as a professional baseball
player and even at that point you’re still not thinking that this is going to be your
career?”
Yes
Interviewer: “Did you think that you were just going to keep playing?”
I never thought that it would last that long you know. We played night after night
wondering how long we were going to be together because sometimes they were talking
you know, about breaking up and things like that, but we never did, so we just kept on
playing.
13
�Interviewer: “What was your last year? You lasted until?”
1950
Interviewer: “The league went on until 1954, how come you left in 1950?” 40:31
I got married, yes in 1950 I got married
Interviewer: “And you just decided that you weren’t going you play baseball
anymore?”
Yeah, and things were getting different and my boyfriend Donald Steffes said, “it’s either
me or baseball”, so I quit and got married.
Interviewer: “So, after that, after you finished, did you miss playing baseball?”
Oh, yeah you do
Interviewer: “Did you ever play another sport after that?”
No, I was married and lived the married life.
Interviewer: “Did you talk about your baseball experience after you were done?”
41:34
Oh, we always talked about it, anyone we met we talked about it and I use to come to the
reunions too and continue to come.
Interviewer: “Well, how did you hear about—did you come to the first reunion?”
Yeah, I think I’ve been to all of them, oh yeah.
Interviewer: “All of them, now let me ask you a real dumb question, why do you
come to the reunions?”
To see, to meet and talk baseball, that’s all we do you know, we get there and we tell
about all these crazy plays we make or something and they will say, “oh, you were so
14
�dumb, you were supposed to the other base”, and they all laugh about it you know. It
was great and the best part of my life.
Interviewer: “What are some of the stories that you tell at the reunion?” 42:32
Oh, I don’t know
Interviewer: “Well third base gets a lot of action.”
Oh yeah, yeah it does
Interviewer: “Especially when you have bases loaded.”
Right, right
Interviewer: “Well, let me ask you this, you did talk about your experiences with
baseball and a lot of the girls never talked about it, didn’t tell their kids, didn’t tell
anybody.”
Oh yeah, you ought to see my room and what I got, pictures and everything and I’ve
gotta—and after seeing those pictures downstairs I start saying mine aren’t so good
because they’re great.
Interviewer: “Were people interested in talking about baseball?”
Anybody that met me would talk about it and, “are you still playing?”
The first question anybody will ask you, “are you still going back?” 43:31
Interviewer: “Did you get a chance to see the movie “A League of Their Own”?”
Yeah, we were in it, we were in it and we were showing them how not to throw it so hard
and we laughed and had more fun with that.
Interviewer: “What did you think of the movie?”
We thought it was great and I thought it was great. A lot of them that saw it came out
came out of their shell and said, “never knew there was any ball league”, and those
15
�pictures they had over here, they aught to put them in a book. You talk to somebody and
they say, “I didn’t know that”. 44:30
Interviewer: “What do you make of all the—the movie came out and in some ways
you’re treated like movie stars. What do you think about that?”
Well, we were for a while there you know. We did some crazy things with them I’m
telling you. Every time you would hit the ball or something they would say, “don’t throw
it so hard”, or something and we just sat down and laughed because they wanted to make
the picture, but they didn’t want to do the business, but it was great, the whole thing you
know.
Interviewer: “You went to Cooperstown?”
Yes
Interviewer: “How was that experience of getting inducted into the hall of fame?”
That was great, that was the first time I saw the whole thing you know and it is just
beautiful there. 45:30
Interviewer: “the movie, I thought, did a pretty good job out of showing the
reactions of the players in there and were you in that scene in the movie?”
Yes
Interviewer: “I’ll look for you the next time I look at it, Ok?”
Yes
Interviewer: “It’s interesting because I teach at the university level and the kids are
usually anywhere from eighteen to twenty and when I told them I’m doing this
documentary about the All American Girls Professional Baseball League, and A
league of their Own, they get all excited over it.”
16
�Everybody loves it and they say, “are you—did you see that picture?” I say, “ yeah, I
was in it”, and they say, “you were?” It was really great and we loved it all the time we
were working on it.
Interviewer: “That was just a few years of your life, a small part of your life, but
how do you look back on that period now? How do you look at it? Is it some thing
that’s very special to you or is it something that just happened? Have you had a
chance to think about it?” 46:41
It’s very special to me because I lived for it and a month before I had to leave town, I was
packing, so it meant everything to us and kids would say, “where is everybody?” They
are different people you know and there was something, the love for the game and we
still loved the people around there and talked to them. We didn’t think we were stars or
anything.
Interviewer: “But you played professional baseball.” 47:41
Yeah, that’s right
Interviewer: “One other question for you, did your mom ever get a chance to see
you play baseball?”
Yes, I think she saw one game and she would say, “I’m not going to watch you get hurt, I
can’t watch you get hurt”, and that’s the first thing she always thought of. She would
say, “you’re going to get hurt”, and I said, “well when the ball is hit to me real hard, I’ll
get out of the way ma”, and she would say, “Yeah, I’ll believe that when I see it”
Interviewer: “You said earlier that your dad didn’t care one way or the other, did
he get a chance to see you play?” 48:28
17
�He probably did, but he wasn’t interested in it. Girls should be in the house, you know,
and wash the dishes. I’m so sick of washing dishes.
Interviewer: “When did your parents find out that you played for the league? Did
they know early on?”
Not really, not really it didn’t mean anything to them that I went out of town. They
thought anybody can do that, we all play ball.
Interviewer: “But that all changed.”
Oh yeah and as the years go by it means more to them.
Interviewer: “You have a special family her, this—you have your own family, but
you have another family that’s all these other girls and all their daughters and their
sons and whatnot.”
We have a big family when we all get together and they all feel the same way and the
mothers talk just like they do, you know. 49:47
Interviewer: “What do you think about this All American Girls Professional
Baseball League? It’s part of American history now.”
Yes, yes it is
Interviewer: “Did you ever think it was going to be that big of a deal?”
No, it was getting slowly and they would get it out there once in a while, but they get it
out there now and everybody says, “A League of Their Own is on”, and everybody is
going and I say, “A League of Their Own”.
Interviewer: “If it’s on TV I can’t change the channel, I just—I don’t care where it
starts or where it ends, I just watch it. My favorite scene is the Tom Hanks and
Geena Davis when she’s about to go with her husband and leave and she said it got
18
�too hard and he said, “It’s supposed to be hard, if it wasn’t hard everybody could do
it”. 50:46
Yeah
Interviewer: “That’s an amazing scene and I use that in class, you gotta work at it.”
It makes sense
Interviewer: “did you get a chance to travel to other countries? Some of the girls
went to Cuba.”
Yes, I did
Interviewer: “How was that experience?”
I don’t know really.
Interviewer: “Just another ball game?”
It’s another ball game, it’s another country and they start talking and I say, “ya, ya, sure”,
you don’t know what they’re talking about and they touch you. We were walking in a
parade coming to the stadium one time and they touch you and get on the floor and
holler, they just go out of their minds. They toss somebody and the guys that are keeping
the line straight and they go up to them and are beating them with a Billy club and they
didn’t care how they hit them. 52:05
Interviewer: “The public was just going crazy about it, so the police came?”
Outside yeah, the police would get them if they would stick in their hand to touch you.
Interviewer: “Where else did you travel to besides Cuba? Did you go any other
places?”
Yeah, I went on the train, I’m trying to think where I went in the wintertime. I played
somewhere, I forgot already.
19
�Interviewer: “Was it South America? No”
I was in Puerto Rico
Interviewer: “Once again, just another ball game?”
Yeah
Interviewer: “No Billy clubs this time I hope.”
No, sometimes they will just run in and do something and run out. Somebody had been
talking and they said it’s like holy people when they run out and throw their arms up and
holler. It’s something sacred and that’s why they come and run out. You got to stop it
because the parade is going on. 53:33
Interviewer: “They thought you were somehow holy people, huh?”
Yeah, little do they know, huh?
Interviewer: “Well Helen it’s been a pleasure talking to you. Is there any story that
you just want to be able to tell because I know you talk to your friends about things.
Are there any stories that you can think of off the top of your head?”
Right now I can’t remember.
Interviewer: “All right.”
20
�
Dublin Core
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Title
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All-American Girls Professional Baseball League Interviews
Creator
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Grand Valley State University. History Department
Description
An account of the resource
The All-American Girls Professional Baseball League was started by Philip Wrigley, owner of the Chicago Cubs, during World War II to fill the void left by the departure of most of the best male baseball players for military service. Players were recruited from across the country, and the league was successful enough to be able to continue on after the war. The league had teams based in Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana and Michigan, and operated between 1943 and 1954. The 1954 season ended with only the Fort Wayne, South Bend, Grand Rapids, Kalamazoo, and Rockford teams remaining. The League gave over 600 women athletes the opportunity to play professional baseball. Many of the players went on to successful careers, and the league itself provided an important precedent for later efforts to promote women's sports.
Source
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<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/484">All-American Girls Professional Baseball League Collection, (RHC-58)</a>
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<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Subject
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Sports for women
World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American
All-American Girls Professional Baseball League--Personal narratives
Oral history
Baseball players--Minnesota
Baseball players--Indiana
Baseball players--Wisconsin
Baseball players--Michigan
Baseball players--Illinois
Baseball for women--United States
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Grand Valley State University Libraries, Special Collections and University Archives, 1 Campus Drive, Allendale, MI, 49401
Identifier
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RHC-58
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video/mp4
application/pdf
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Moving Image
Text
Language
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eng
Date
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2017-10-02
Contributor
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Smither, James
Boring, Frank
Relation
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Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Oral History
A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge.
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RHC-58_HFilarski
Title
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Filarski, Helen (Interview transcript and video), 2010
Creator
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Filarski, Helen
Description
An account of the resource
Helen Filarski Steffes was born in Detroit, Michigan in 1924. She grew up playing baseball with boys in the neighborhood. She met some of the players from the All American league who encouraged her to try out, and went on to play third base for Rockford, Peoria, Kenosha and South Bend between 1944 and 1950.
Contributor
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Boring, Frank (Interviewer)
Publisher
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Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives
Subject
The topic of the resource
Oral history
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Video recordings
All-American Girls Professional Baseball League--Personal narratives
Baseball for women--United States
Baseball
Sports for women
World War, 1939-1945
Baseball players--Indiana
Baseball players--Illinois
Baseball players--Wisconsin
Women
Language
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eng
Rights
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<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Type
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Moving Image
Text
Relation
A related resource
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2010-07-02
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/484">All-American Girls Professional Baseball League Collection, (RHC-55)</a>
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application/pdf
video/mp4
-
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/41d087b9127acdcb485509201188988e.mp4
fed9d551737081ab7fe135202a35fe0a
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/04969cfe6d881664277b8640c995c541.pdf
ebbab5520f98cfdacb2f9e24102d7444
PDF Text
Text
1
Grand Valley State University
All American Girls Professional Baseball League
Veteran’s History Project
Interviewee’s Name: Mary Froning
Length of Interview: (43:24)
Interviewed by: James Smither
Transcribed by: Lindsey Thatcher, April 14, 2011
Interviewer: “Okay, let’s begin with your full name and where and when were you born?”
My full name is Mary Froning O’Meara. I was born in Minster, Ohio 8/26/1934.
Interviewer: “What was your early childhood like? What was the family situation?”
I lived with my mother and father in this small town in Minster, Ohio. It was an all German
community and I went to an elementary school and high school there. I lived across the street.
Actually the whole town is Catholic and a big church down the block from myself. In my early
childhood, I have also a twin sister, so my twin sister and I went to (01:00)Minster grade school
and Minster High School. The eighth grade through grade school and four years at the high
school.
Interviewer: “Now, were there any organized sports for girls at the Catholic school?”
Actually it isn’t a Catholic school.
Interviewer: “Okay.”
It was run by the state. We had the only school in the state of Ohio that was run by the state of
Ohio. We had nuns, we had priests and instead of saying religion they called it ethics in school.
But, anyhow, back to your other question is, we had the CYO organization, which was the
Catholic Youth Organization. In which I participated in when I was in the 5th, 6th, 7th and 8th and
through high school and that was the only sport I could play.
(2:02)
Interviewer: “What was the sport?”
It was softball. So I played that, the first coach I had was a priest, and from then on it was
different coaches.
Interviewer: “Now did you play with your sister also, play ball?”
Yes, she also played. Martha played second base and I was short stop.
�2
Interviewer: “Is this water for…”
No, I’m okay. I’m fine.
Interviewer: “The, okay, I went to Catholic school with the real uniforms and the white
socks and the little patch and the whole bit, you didn’t have to go through that, huh?”
No.
Interviewer: “The softball you played was part of the school curriculum?”
No, this was different, it was a club sport. You didn’t have to pay to get in. You just tried out and
make the team (03:00). It was just something for the girls to do. I loved softball, so I tried out
for it and made it when I was in the fifth grade.
Interviewer: “Wow! So each year, each school year, where would the baseball played
during that period of time? During the summers only?”
What do you mean, the baseball? Can I have some water?
Interviewer: “Sure, Tom, can we have….here is the water.”
Okay…
Interviewer: “Alright, Tom? Playing during the summer for 5th grade, 6th grade, all the
way through every single summer through…”
Except when I was scouted to play in my junior year.
Interviewer: “Wait a minute, I don’t want to get there quite yet. What I am trying to get
across, what I want to get across, is that when you are playing that regularly, especially as a
young person, you are going to get better. The more you play, you’re going to get better
(04:00). So, was there a lot of competition between you and your sister about?”
No, Martha and I, I mean it was good practice, because we could go home and throw the ball.
Actually, when I was playing probably in the 8th or 9th grade, I knew I was better than practically
anybody else. So I could run fast, I could throw, I had a good arm, I could hit. And so when we
played other teams, when I came up to bat and I could make home runs and outrun them. And
my sister Martha and I would make double plays, so that helped us. I had my friend Kay
Horsema in left field and she played at that point.
Interviewer: “Were your parents supportive of this?”
Yes.
Interviewer: “I was going to say the equipment…”
�3
They would come watch us play. I had two older brothers, I should say one older and one
younger than me. (04:58) As for as playing sports, I loved it; I mean it, I could probably have
been on the boy’s baseball team in high school. Being a girl, there was no way to do it. So
instead of that I became a cheerleader. And that’s what we could do; we could be a cheerleader
for basketball and football.
Interviewer: “Now, had you heard about the women’s professional, Professional All
American Girls Baseball Team, when you were in school?”
No.
Interviewer: “Okay.”
If we are going to get when I was recruited, I was a junior in high school. I was playing on a
Sunday afternoon, softball. And, apparently in South Bend, they do have a Board of Directors.
So one of the board of director’s mother lives in Minster, Ohio, he was coming by apparently
(06:00), and a week later, he sent me a contract. My dad and I looked at it, my mother looked at
it and he said it’s not softball, this is baseball. And I thought it is in South Bend, Indiana. I had
never been there and I should say the other team that was there was in Fort Wayne which is only
seventy miles away. I never heard of them, I never did. Nobody wrote it in the paper, what small
town that we had. The Dayton Daily News did not pick it up. So in so far as knowing what to do,
they sent me the contract. I looked at it and said I will certainly try out. That is in 1951, this was
in March. I went in to Spring Training in May in South Bend. There must have been probably, I
would say, about a hundred trying out (06:59), there were four positions. Being rookies and with
the manager which was Karl Winsch to play ball.
Interviewer: “Now, how did you get there?”
By bus, my first Greyhound bus ride, that was wonderful. I went from Salina to South Bend,
Indiana.
Interviewer: “You were sixteen?”
I was sixteen years old.
Interviewer: “How was that trip, what were you thinking about?”
Nothing, you know, here I am on the bus going to play baseball. That’s all I could think about,
meeting different people, and the person actually the board of directors, the gentleman that did it.
I stayed with him for the first couple of days. And the other hard part was getting on a trolley to
go to the Palin Park, is where we played. That was hard. Where I was coming from you were in a
car or you were walking, or riding a bike, right? That was enjoyable too. Because South Bend
was quite large at the time it had a hundred and fifty thousand people and you’re looking at my
home town which had 1,500.
�4
(08:18)
Interviewer: “Now, where was your twin sister in all this?”
My twin sister was at home, she also tried out, but when the tryouts came, she did not want to
play ball. She wanted to become a nurse, so she went home and did that. She did become a nurse.
Interviewer: “Okay, so she did.”
Yes.
Interviewer: “But you had the opportunity- you wanted to play?”
I wanted to play.
Interviewer: “But, the thing I am a little confused about is the, you had been playing
softball since fifth grade…”
Yes.
Interviewer: “And now you are being asked to, by this time the league had hardball.
Right?”
Oh, yes.
Interviewer: “Oh, Yeah.”
By the time, it came in 1951, it was overhand pitching and the size of the ball was ten inches and
the pitching mound was fifty-five feet and the bases were, I think at that point seventy or longer
(9:17). And so this was the first time in my entire life, so what I did first was I had a baseball
from my brother and I started throwing the baseball and that helped. So when I got there before
the try outs I knew how to hit, I knew how to throw and we would hit, Karl the manger, would
hit the flies to us in the outfield. They called me, well they really called me flash, fearless
running over fences and stuff. So I tried out in South Bend and there were quite a few people
there. They took four, and I was one of the four, (10:01) so. One of the high points of my life;
here I am I am going to be really playing I get a uniform that is a skirt, I can slide, a uniform
that’s a skirt which I normally had pants on before. I looked at it and I said “Gosh, look at that
uniform, it looks wonderful!” It did. We had socks and stirrups and baseball caps.
Interviewer: “All of the girls that I have talked to about the uniform said that they had to
adjust it in some way; did you have to do that with yours?”
Yes, well actually when I came there you would try one on and they also had a seamstress, so if
it was too long you know, which I wanted a mini skirt like anyhow…she would adjust it to your
size. So we had two uniforms, we had one on (11:00) the road and one at home. So they would
�5
have them dry cleaned after you left to go on a road trip and when you came home it was waiting
for you.
Interviewer: “Now you move, during the season you moved to South Bend?”
Oh, yes.
Interviewer: “Where did you stay?”
I stayed, all of us stayed with people in homes. I was in a house with other rookies. In fact Lois
Youngen, Dolly Vanderlip, and another girl I can’t remember her name. We stayed with a lady
by the name of Mrs. Kelly. So there is where we stayed and after we played ball we came back
and we stayed with her and then we went on the road and when we came back we would stay
with her. She was paid, I don’t think we paid her, I think the League (12:00) or I think we did
pay her.
Interviewer: “So it was rent. You were basically renting a room in the, yeah. So how was
the first season rookie?”
The first season I sat on the bench. My manager Karl said: “Mary, I want you to learn this
game”. In 1951 the South Bend Blue Sox won the world series so there was no way, every
position was taken care of and there was no way that I could get out there unless somebody
broke a leg. But what they did do was to, I would pitch one inning. So I would hit and I would go
to first base on my way out, so that’s okay because I was fast. I also sat on the bench and he said
“I want you to watch what you do and what signs I give you so that when you are up to bat you
know what it is”. The other thing I would do, which I don’t know (13:00), is I would sit on the
bench and they did smoke, I would hold their cigarettes when they were on the field and they
would come back and they would have it. It was very interesting the first year, it was hard. It was
so different from softball because you had longer bases and actually you could steal without
having to worry about the pitch going over home plate and stuff so that was my first year
experience.
Interviewer: “Now once you had your first season, did you return back home?”
I returned back to Minster. I finished my senior year at Minster, Ohio and I graduated and at that
point they let us know when to come for spring training. So that was, we played 112 games a
year so spring training was at, sort of like at the end of April. I graduated May 22 (14:00), I went
back for graduation and then I continued on with the team in 1952.
Interviewer: “Now, when you got back from your first season and you were back in school
now, was anybody talking to you about the fact that you played professional baseball?”
No because they had no idea what I was doing, no idea. Even my, my mother and father used to
come to Ft. Wayne to watch me play, in 1952. Because that was where we did play and it was
�6
only 7 miles away so they saw me play. My brother came with his wife and they saw me and
Martha did too, my sister. But as far as people in Minster knowing that I was a professional
baseball player and that I was getting paid, not very much but it was enjoyable. They had no
idea. What is (15:00)_ summer and do? I played and was a professional baseball player. And
that’s what I am. Everyone in South Bend knew about the girls, everybody in Ft. Wayne knew
who the girls were. Everybody in Michigan knew about the girls: Grand Rapids, Muskegon,
Battle Creek they all knew who we were, Racine, the other teams. Everybody in the city knew.
Because what they did they had post scores, they would be on radio in South Bend, they would
be on the radio and they would interview you. And I had my photograph taken and they would
put the photograph in the store downtown in South Bend and they would have the schedule on
us, and people would come out and watch the South Bend Blue Sox play. And that was how
there was advertising.
Interviewer: “How was your second season?”
Second season, okay. That would 1953. I got better. I hit home runs inside the park homeruns.
Interviewer: “But the team is giving you a chance to play now?”
Oh, yes. Because a lot of them at that point, a lot of ones that had played all along…
Interviewer: “The veterans?”
Yes the veterans. They went off to (16:30) school to further their educations, you know teachers.
Or they went back to work, or…and I was only 17, I mean I didn’t have a job I wanted to play
ball.
Interviewer: “So now you have gone from being rookie, into playing in the regular lineup?”
Yes, and I did this for 3 years.
Interviewer: “Now was there any sense, I realize you were 17 or 18 years old, but was
there any sense that this was going to be your career, baseball?”
I never really thought about it. The thing that I thought about was “Here I am, playing baseball. I
do get money to play”. As far as the going back to school, it never entered my mind. Because
every, after the season was over I would work I stayed in Kalamazoo one season and worked,
and another season I stayed in Rockford. So every season after our season I did work.
Interviewer: “Now your sister already knew what she wanted to do?”
Yes.
Interviewer: “She wanted to be a nurse?”
�7
Yes, a nurse.
Interviewer: “Now was there any discussion either with your sister or your parents about
what you were going to do? Besides play baseball.”
No, I mean there wasn’t (18:00) very many opportunities in 1952 when you graduated to do as
far as, you could get married, you could go to school to become a nurse, you could work in the
factory, or you could further your education and become a teacher. Now those were your
choices. So at that point I said “I don’t want any of those choices, that’s not me”. So I just kept
playing ball and then when I was in, actually in Rockford working there. My friend who flew for
TWA, called me and she said “Mary, I want you to come and I want you to interview with 3
different airlines, I would like for you, if you would like to do this, come up to Chicago and
interview”. So at that point afterwards I think it was 56? No 55 and 56 that’s when I went. I was
interviewed with the airlines was something else. I go up there I was to be at a certain time in
Chicago. At midnight all the interviews took place with the airlines (19:30). My first one was
with TWA, my second one was with United and the third was with Parody airlines. So I had a
certain time I was interviewing with this young man, and he was asking me what I did before I
came and what my education was and why I am here and all of that. So I started to tell him about
my career before I came and I told him I played professional baseball and he stopped right in his
tracks. He had no idea that even in Chicago; we weren’t written up in the paper in Chicago that I
had played professional baseball. And at that point we had no baseball cards so I couldn’t prove
him that I had played. So he said that’s really nice. So he said “I’m going to set you up with
another interview and I want you to come back, but first of all I want you to go to charm school”.
So I had to go to charm school for a week, for the make-up and for the walking and everything to
be in the airlines. So I did that for a week, I came back and also what helps too, is that you are
interviewed by different people, not the same person (21:00). So I was interviewed by a different
person and I made it.
Interviewer: “I know that when you started out your first year, the charm school for the
League had already stopped right? So you had didn’t have any of that kind of…?”
No we had none of that. Charm school I think was ’43 when we first started. We had one of the
ladies to look like ladies, no short haircuts you always had to wear lipstick, you always had to be,
you couldn’t smoke you always had to wear dresses, no slacks no jeans. You had to set yourself
as elegant.
Interviewer: “In your first couple of seasons, how were the fans?”
The fans were great. Actually in South Bend I would say there may be about 2 or 3,000 people
who would come. The majority were night games. And the fans all the ladies wore dresses all the
men had suits on all the men had hats on, nobody ever had shorts on they were always dressed
like men and women.
�8
Interviewer: “The, you said that you had sometimes 2 or 3,000 people show up?”
Yes we did, and these were night games. You always started at 7 or 7:30. We always had
programs you could buy. The programs were 25 cents, no programs were 10 cents. To get in was
25 cents. So it was very, people loved us they were very (23:00) came out, everybody was happy
to see us play and would ask for our autograph. And after we played we all went out for dinner.
Or if we had a road trip after we would eat and then get on the bus for the longest trip on the bus
was from South Bend to Rockford that was a long one. We would arrive in Rockford in the early
morning. People were walking going to work. And Karl would, we were all on the bus and Karl
would open the door up and say “Come on out and watch us beat the Peaches”. And they would
laugh and people would say “Oh no you’re not”. So that’s how we got fans too. But everybody
loved the Peaches so they had a big following that really nice for them, same as in Kalamazoo.
They also had a big draw they had a brand new stadium and ball park to play in.
Interviewer: “What were the road trips like?”
Road trips were fun I mean you would be tired from playing the game, 9 innings of ball and then
you would get on and you had to put your dress on and your skirt on and sit there and you got
some sleep but not a lot, so actually if you did arrive (24:30) say in Rockford, you would go to
the hotel and you would nap for awhile and then you would get up. A lot of it was like “Where
am I today?” and then we would be like, “Oh, we’re in Rockford”. We’d get up and we had
practice, and if we did lose games we had practice every day after that. We would have, Karl, we
would have meetings in the morning Karl would give us our signs for the game for that night I
should say.
Interviewer: “By signs you mean the special stuff they would do with you?”
Yes, the special stuff that would they said, right. Actually if you stepped out the box you would
look at him, I was very good at bunting. I could easily be the first or second to enter and I had
lots of people enter behind me, and I loved to steal bases.
Interviewer: “I only played Little League but my claim to fame is that I hit a homerun on
a bunt.”
On a bunt? When you were 5 years…
Interviewer: “The other team was over throwing and everything. I didn’t know what I was
doing I was just, I was a fairly decent pitcher but I couldn’t hit for anything.”
That was a lot of people’s problems. You could catch, you could run: hitting takes an eye. We
had several, several women (26:00) who were just very good hitters, excellent.
Interviewer: “So as of the third year, the fourth year were the fans, were you still getting
more people? Because I’ve heard from some that there were less people.
�9
Yeah, actually it dwindled. Remember the war was over in ’45. All the baseball players, the
Major League baseball players came back. So they drew more in Chicago and they drew more in
where they had the major leagues more. These teams had started probably about 1952. I
remember we had one set in Minster Ohio and everybody went over to witness it, Howdy Doody
was on. so the TV came in ’52. In ’53 there was still a lot of people enjoying our League because
it was still a League. In ’54 it started to dwindle, but not too many people, by not too many
people I mean we still had 5 or 600 people and that was when we the League started to disband.
It had gone 12 years, there was no more new interest.
Interviewer: “Now what was there discussion amongst you about what is going to happen
next year (27:30)? Are we going to be working anymore?”
No, actually when I left, I received a letter in 1954…’55 I should say, that the League was
disbanding and there would be no more professional baseball.
Interviewer: “What was your reaction to that?”
I was sad. It was something I had done over the summers. Why quit now? That was, there was no
more baseball. So I decided to pursue my other life.
Interviewer: “Now you then got into the airlines, you have continued on. Now, did you
ever talk about the fact that you were a baseball player when you were employed by the
airlines?”
No, I did not. Because at that point nobody knew it, I could say “Yes, I played professional
baseball”; well I proved it one time we were on a flight going from Chicago to Syracuse and we
actually got off the flight, I remember we had 108 inches of snow, and the snow banks were
umpteen feet up in the air as we came in (29:00). Now I’m flying on a Conveyer that seats 40
people, we have 1 pilot, and we have no flight engineers, so when we go down everybody has
their own individual room. So the guy the pilot thought that he would be pretty smart and he was
going to throw us a snowball. Well he did, that was completely wrong. Because I picked up one,
and he never knew what hit him. That was the, at that point I couldn’t say “Well, I played
professional baseball”, you know that’s why I just about gave it to him. But, no I never talked
about it. I was never recognized in my hometown of Minster Ohio as being a professional
baseball player. The only time that I was recognized in Minster, we were they have parades
during Oktoberfest so my friend Katie and I were in the parade for being recognized as baseball
players.
Interviewer: “Now when was this? Was this in the late ‘50s or ‘60s, much later?”
It was later, yes much later after maybe 20 years.
Interviewer: “Okay, almost every one of you that I have talked to that they just didn’t talk
about it (30:30), they didn’t tell their kids about it or anything like that. But at some point
�10
you went back to that period of time because did you go to that first reunion? I mean, how
did you get back acquainted?”
The first reunion was in Chicago in 1980 and that was really wonderful.
Interviewer: “So you went?”
Oh yes, absolutely.
Interviewer: “I guess what I am trying to get at is that you have gone all of these years …”
Without speaking about baseball, that’s right. Because nobody knew us, nobody knew what I
did. I mean I graduated from high school and they said “what are you doing this summer?” I’m
going to play ball. “Oh okay”. Nobody came out to watch me nobody from Minster came out to
watch me. It was like you must have done something bad. No, I didn’t do something bad, I
played baseball; and so when they made the movie that’s what really, really helped us. Then
people recognized what we did. And the people in my hometown did and they had parades for it
like I told you about. So that was wonderful and I told my family I played ball and they knew I
played ball because I coached them into how to play ball-softball, that’s what I played. And my
son was a baseball player and they knew that I played. And I was on the city league (32:00) and
the girl and I was playing fast pitch softball and I started to bunt and she said “Where did you
learn that?” I played professional baseball. “You played professional baseball?” So that’s how it
came about so as you know and everybody A League of Their Own movie helped us.
Interviewer: “What did you think of the movie?”
I thought it was great. Actually I met, I was there in Scopie? _, I was one of the 50 or 55 that
went there for a part in the movie. We met other people that were in the movie. We met Penny
Marshall, I threw softball with her, they had baseballs and softballs, and well they had baseballs.
But I threw ball with her and Madonna was there and she was sort of off limits so I got her
autograph but she came in her big Cadillac with body guards. Well she was famous; she made a
lot of money. So Penny was very grateful that she was in the movie and then before that she had
made big, so Tom Hanks is a tremendous baseball player and he loved being the coach. “You
mean I don’t have to get skinny?”, and anyway so it was the idea that he was [Jimmy Fox?].
Anyway, her daughter was in the (33:30) movie I met all of the players I mean Penny, Rosie, and
these people really are why we became famous. And that’s why the movie was, everybody was
crazy for it.
Interviewer: “How did your life change after that movie came out?”
Actually I was playing softball and the ladies I taught how to play softball knew that I had played
professional baseball and they had an idea, but they didn’t know really what I did, they knew I
played for the South Bend Blue Sox so when the movie came to Madison I was there and I was
�11
interviewed by the people from the TV station about they interviewed me. I knew that at that
point they thought “Wow, she lives in Madison and she played professional baseball”.
Interviewer: “This is going to sound like a stupid question but why do you come to the
reunions?”
I actually come to the reunions to see my friends. The majority of my friends played 51-54. I do
know some of the ladies that played at the beginning of the League and it was (35:00), so I come
because I enjoy being with the people and being interviewed by people. It is very nice the
reunions are very well organized, the people are very nice. And you see different kinds, I had
never been to Detroit so we come and I enjoy it.
Interviewer: “Now you mentioned a son, so you did eventually get married?”
Yes, I got married in 1958.
Interviewer: “Okay.”
So in 1958 after I flew for the airlines for a time before and during when I was flying. We got
married in 1958 and I could not go back and become a stewardess, it was not allowed. So after
marriage you could not fly, if you wore glasses you could not fly, you had to be a certain height a
certain weight, oh yes there were lots and lots of restrictions. So I got married in 1958 and we
moved to Madison and I raised 4 children, 3 daughters and a son.
Interviewer: “And you said earlier that they knew about your baseball career, but did you
let them know early on or is it something that they found out on their own later when the
movie came out (36:30), your kids?”
Oh they knew before when they grew up and realized that I also organized my son’s baseball and
they knew that I had played baseball and other coaches asked me to do this for them. But nobody
knew that how many teams there were how many players had done this and when we did this in
’43, nobody knew that. So it was, I mean it as we could say again, when the movie came out
everybody knew.
Interviewer: “What do you make of all of this superstardom? I mean think about it for a
moment, there are baseball teams all over place, and there are fans. But I have never
experienced the kind of adoration that the public seems to have for your group. You see it
little girls coming up to you, you see the public ‘Oh!’ of course they always say A League of
Their Own and you are right it is the movie that really made that known, but what do you
think about this whole hoopla, my gosh?”
I think that, even when I was on a plane coming here, sitting next to the guy “What are you going
to do in Detroit?” “Well I’m going to a baseball reunion”. “You mean A League of Their Own?”
“Yes, that what I mean”, and everybody around me turned around (38:00) to see what I looked
�12
like and what I did. So I explained to everybody what I did, I played ball. I think the majority is
when people come to our reunion and the look at us and say “Now you actually played baseball,
not softball?” “Baseball.” and they admire that, little kid’s do. All the little kids do, actually I
coach little kids, they didn’t know I played baseball but they knew I knew baseball and that was
the idea behind it. I knew what to do. I knew what to do when I coached my son’s team, that’s
what they asked me to do. I had two kids that I coached and played softball, these ladies, their
daughters played and they came up and asked me if I would coach them and teach them how to
play softball, so I did it for 15 years. I told them we’ll have practice on Tuesday and play on
Thursday, they did and they enjoyed it.
Interviewer: “I know that the questions I have asked of all of you that during the period of
the time that you played it was for the love of the game it was the fun the camaraderie, and
never really thought (39:30) that it was going to go anywhere beyond that. But now people
are saying to you, I am saying to you that this was an important part of American history.
Now I’m, pretty sure none of you thought ‘hmm, I’m going to play baseball and be a part
of American history.’ But how do you, I mean you have to accept the fact that people are
looking at this, you are put in the baseball hall of fame, Ken burns did a documentary out
baseball and said here was this amazing period of time, how do you react to this, this
realization that you are part of American history ?”
Yes, which at the time we were playing we had no idea that we would be recognized in the
baseball hall of fame and that we were a part of history. And the part of history never entered our
minds until they said okay we will make a movie about you. You are the pioneers of baseball;
and then it hit us. That we did do something that was great.
Interviewer: “How do you look back on that period now. I mean you get a chance to reflect
about this. You’ve had a full life, you have had kids you have a husband, this is just a small
segment?”
A small segment. Yes that was like, I was growing up. I was 16, I had I didn’t have to go to
school anymore I just played ball and I actually made (41:00) money. I knew eventually up
ahead that I would have to go on with my life with school or get a job or something but at that
point, when I was playing I never thought about it. I never could, because I didn’t think that we
were the pioneers of baseball, It was when I was playing softball in Minster, I’m not a pioneer of
softball however I am a pioneer of professional baseball and that’s what is great.
Interviewer: “Does that, looking back on it did those 4 years have a major impact on the
person you became?”
Well, no I don’t think so it was a lot of discipline which I had to have because I was quite proud
in high school. The idea was that it was a lot of discipline and Karl was a very good manager
and, no I think in the 4 years that I played the enjoyment of playing a sport 4 years was
�13
wonderful. An organized team and I didn’t think I was a pioneer of baseball I was just an All
American that played ball.
Interviewer: “Thank you so much, wonderful wonderful.”
Thank you.
(42:33)
�14
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
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All-American Girls Professional Baseball League Interviews
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Grand Valley State University. History Department
Description
An account of the resource
The All-American Girls Professional Baseball League was started by Philip Wrigley, owner of the Chicago Cubs, during World War II to fill the void left by the departure of most of the best male baseball players for military service. Players were recruited from across the country, and the league was successful enough to be able to continue on after the war. The league had teams based in Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana and Michigan, and operated between 1943 and 1954. The 1954 season ended with only the Fort Wayne, South Bend, Grand Rapids, Kalamazoo, and Rockford teams remaining. The League gave over 600 women athletes the opportunity to play professional baseball. Many of the players went on to successful careers, and the league itself provided an important precedent for later efforts to promote women's sports.
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/484">All-American Girls Professional Baseball League Collection, (RHC-58)</a>
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Subject
The topic of the resource
Sports for women
World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American
All-American Girls Professional Baseball League--Personal narratives
Oral history
Baseball players--Minnesota
Baseball players--Indiana
Baseball players--Wisconsin
Baseball players--Michigan
Baseball players--Illinois
Baseball for women--United States
Publisher
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Grand Valley State University Libraries, Special Collections and University Archives, 1 Campus Drive, Allendale, MI, 49401
Identifier
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RHC-58
Format
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video/mp4
application/pdf
Type
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Moving Image
Text
Language
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eng
Date
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2017-10-02
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Smither, James
Boring, Frank
Relation
A related resource
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Oral History
A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Identifier
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RHC-58_MFroning1123BB
Title
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Froning, Mary (Interview transcript and video), 2010
Creator
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Froning, Mary
Description
An account of the resource
Mary Froning O'Meara was born in Minster, Ohio, in 1934. She played on softball teams run by the local Catholic Youth Organization while in school, and was recruited into the AAGPBL in 1951. She played outfield for the South Bend Blue Sox from 1951 until the league folded in 1954. After baseball, she worked as an airline stewardess for several years, and then married and raised a family, and continued to play and coach baseball and softball.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Boring, Frank(Interviewer)
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives
Subject
The topic of the resource
Oral history
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Video recordings
All-American Girls Professional Baseball League--Personal narratives
Baseball for women--United States
Baseball
Sports for women
World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American
Baseball players--Indiana
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Moving Image
Text
Relation
A related resource
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2010-08-08
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/484">All-American Girls Professional Baseball League Collection, (RHC-55)</a>
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
application/pdf
video/mp4
-
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/b8fd1bbd0fa463a5aa10108b00ad5c2a.mp4
06d61d88545864e9d65d52d0d53eec8e
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/c59b2669d7199bfb9db74883eed6c3bf.pdf
fd9f8b72445acd162eb9b6038fdc7674
PDF Text
Text
ORAL HISTORY INTERVIEW
GINGER GASCON
Women in Baseball
Born: Chicago, Illinois, 1931
Resides: Elk Grove Village, Illinois
Interviewed by: James Smither Ph.D, GVSU Veterans History Project, August 6, 2010,
Detroit, MI at the All American Girls Professional Baseball League reunion.
Transcribed by: Joan Raymer, February 10, 2011
Interviewer: “Ginger, can we start off by you telling us a little bit about your
background. Where and when were you born?”
I was born in Chicago in 1931.
Interviewer: “Did you grow up in Chicago?”
I did, I grew up in Chicago.
Interviewer: “What neighborhood did you live in?”
We lived in a few different neighborhoods, one on the west side of Chicago, but the one I
remember the best is the one near Wrigley field, near Hawthorn school. I think we
moved there when I was about eight or ten and we stayed there until I was eighteen.
Interviewer: “What did your family do for a living?”
My dad was a truck driver and he use to drive paper goods to northern Minnesota and
Michigan and come back and deliver down to the Chicago Tribune building. My mother
was a housewife and she was an Irish immigrant. 42:48
Interviewer: “Was your father able to keep that job through the thirties?”
Whatever he did he was on “Papa Works Again” and he use to bring home Blueberry pie
and whatever his main work was I don’t know, but that’s what it was to keep the fellas
going and that was good
Interviewer: “Jobs were not always easy at that point.”
1
�Not at that point.
Interviewer: “How did you get involved playing sports?”
I happen to be the only girl in the neighborhood of all boys and that was from age ten on,
so if I didn’t play with them, I wouldn’t be playing with anybody. I started out on the
playgrounds and I played ball there and I was pretty good. I was one of the better ones
that always went off to the division meeting and everything.
Interviewer: “Were you playing in organized leagues?”
No, remember I was ten or twelve years old, but I had an uncle who was a cop and he
was a policeman on the gate at Wrigley Field and I only had about a six block walk down
there. 43:46 When he would see me, he would say, “come on, get in”, so I got to watch
Phil Cavarretta, Andy Pafko and those fellas and I just kind of fell in love with it from
playing—we started out with sixteen inch and fourteen inch.
Interviewer: “So, you’re playing softball in the street?”
Playing softball
Interviewer: “You were there in 1945, the last time the cubs were in the World
Series?”
Yes, I think so, but I don’t remember going to that World Series.
Interviewer: “You might have been in school by then?”
Yes, I think I was in school.
Interviewer: “It might have been a little bit harder to get in.”
Yeah, but when I was in school during WWII, they use to let some of us out of school to
go out and collect tine and things during the day and that was kind of fun to go around
the neighborhood and do things like that. When I got one of my first jobs I was the only
2
�girls in that district with all boys that delivered newspapers and that was nice because
some of the boys were a little lazy and they would ask me to take their route for the day
and I would make a few dollars there and I kind of liked that. 44:47
Interviewer: “All right, now at what point did you start to play more organized
ball?”
Fifteen, sixteen and there was a team, they were all farm teams for this all American
league, and I played on the North Town Debs and there was the south group of girls that
played too and when they created the Sallies and the Colleens, I went with the Sallies and
some of my friends went with the Colleens and we toured the United States. I know
you’ve heard that before, all the various cities and states.
Interviewer: “Right, so let’s back up a little bit to that first stage. How did you
wind up joining that first team?”
Joining the first team? They picked you, they looked for the best athletes and they picked
you.
Interviewer: “How did they find you or where did they locate you?”
On the playgrounds, it started on the playgrounds in Chicago.
Interviewer: “So you weren’t playing in an organized softball league or anything
like that?” 45:44
I was on a girl’s team in Chicago, but it was just eighth graders or something like that.
Interviewer: “But they were actually scouting the neighborhoods to go find people.”
Scouting the neighborhoods or they would here about and go and ask the athletic
directors and we did tryout for that, that’s right, we did tryout for those farm teams.
Interviewer: “Once you’re on one of those teams do you just live at home?”
3
�You live at home and go out three or four nights a week and on the week-end and play
each other in various parks in the city.
Interviewer: “What did your family think about that?”
They didn’t mind, they liked it and I was always very active and I had my paper route
and everything. I had two younger sisters, so they kind of looked up to me because I
would take them out to places with me, to different and various places.
Interviewer: “All right, were they paying you at that point?”
Let me see, when is the first time I got paid? On the traveling team in 1949.
Interviewer: “So, the first level of team you’re just playing?”
Yeah, you’re a farm team and you just show up and play. 46:47 No money involved,
just your skill level and all that.
Interviewer: “So, did you do that for one year or two or?”
Probably two years, I played for two years.
Interviewer: “How do you get up to the next level?”
That’s when you tried out, they had tryouts for the All Americans and that’s when they
picked you again from that group, so that’s how some of us got in.
Interviewer: “Where were they doing the tryouts?”
At the various parks around—in Skokie, the tryouts were there and see, Wrigley Field
had already had all the girls back for the first stage and now this comes five years later
and then the coaches came and looked at us and picked and put us, after we traveled and
di that for the year, they picked us to come to whatever teams and you probably heard
that story from other girls. The balanced the teams by skill level and whatever they
needed. 47:48
4
�Interviewer: “So, what was the year then that you started playing with the traveling
teams?”
1949 and in 1950 I came back and played with Chicago for a year, underhand fast pitch
with the Bluebirds and then I went back in 1951 to the Grand Rapids Chicks and finally I
settled in and played another three years with the Bluebirds because I could hold a day
job and play ball and I had two salaries.
Interviewer: “The Bluebirds, was that a semi-pro softball team?”
It was a pro team also, you paid to get in and we got paid. I started out with that team at
about a hundred dollars a week and went up to a hundred and a quarter. See, the all
Americans was fifty five and seventy five, but holding the day job was the bonus because
you had a double salary and that’s when I started saving money for college.
Interviewer: “Let’s go back to the farm team experience. Were there basically just
two teams that played each other or were there more?”
There were four, but I can’t remember the other two. I remember the Debs and the—
you’ll hear it from one of the other ladies, the team she played on. She was a southsider
and I was a northsider. 48:54
Interviewer: “Did fans come to these games?”
Oh yeah, the parks were full every night. Are you familiar with Chicago Thillens
Stadium on Devon and Lincoln Ave? The Thillens check cashing trucks? I don’t know
if you remember seeing them running around? They sponsored us, so they gave us the
money for uniforms and people came into the park at night and I think they were paying a
quarter or something.
Interviewer: “How do things change then when you join the traveling team?”
5
�When you join the traveling team, that’s the fun. You know you’re traveling to different
cities and meeting different people and you’re on the bus singing at night. It’s just the
excitement and the camaraderie of having all these friends around you all the time. You
think about high school and when high school days were over, that’s who your friends
are. Most of them don’t go to college and we had that extended into our twenties and we
still meet. I can’t think of any other group of people who still meet from when they were
in their teens. I just think we have been terribly lucky in that manner. It’s been a
wonderful thing. 49:55
Interviewer: “I think the closest you get, maybe in some cases, is with military
veterans. Men who served in the same unit, they have reunions, but in a way it
parallels a little bit because it’s a distinctive experience more than just going to
school someplace.”
It’s a shared experience.
Interviewer: “Right, and you’re at that point in your life that you’re becoming who
you really are too. That’s a very consistent thing that we’ve had in this. Explain a
little bit for people who don’t know very much about it, how did the traveling team
thing work? Who was on it, what happened?”
There were scouts with the All American, Max Carey and those fellas, they would go out
to the major cities in America or the ones they decided they could get some interest in,
and they would talk to the Chamber of Commerce and their press men and their sports
people and they would arrange for us to come in at certain dates, and they did it very well
because they started out in Chicago and went down to Missouri, Oklahoma and Texas.
50:56 Crossed over to Virginia and finally got back to New York and over Pennsylvania,
6
�so it was just play a game or two, get on the bus and go to the next town and play a game
or two. On Sunday it was two games, we use to play two games on Sunday, but we
stayed in different hotels and met different people. I remember in Michigan, Battle
Creek, when these fellas would carry our luggage to the hotel, you know from the bus
into and up to our rooms, we played music because we liked the rhythm and blues music
and they use to hangout in the halls with us and that was a lot of fun. It was almost like
you were dating groups, but it wasn’t really.
Interviewer: “Did you go to New York City as part of that?”
Yes, we stayed in Newark, New Jersey and we got on the train. I don’t know if anyone’s
told you this, but we had Mirtha Marrero and Isabel Alvarez and it just so happened I had
Spanish in high school, so I was the only one that could talk to them a little bit, so I took
them on the train from Newark into New York. 51:57 We went to the Palladium
because Mambo was popular at the time and then we went to the Empire State Building
and of course once they saw the guys at the Palladium they were in a different kind of
world than the rest of us, so I left them to go to the john and said, “don’t move, I’ll be
back”, and when I came back they were gone. They were gone for hours and hours and I
had to call back to the chaperone and say, “I lost the girls, they left me”, and so I got back
on the train by myself and they finally showed up, but that was kind of harrowing
because I felt responsible for them, but I couldn’t control them. 52:36
Interviewer: “Where did you play in New York?”
We were playing in Newark, New Jersey and that was in 1949 and they played in New
York in 1950, they played in one of those fields.
Interviewer: “At some point they played in Yankee Stadium.”
7
�We didn’t, the 49ers didn’t, but the 50ers did.
Interviewer: “What other places you stopped at stands out in your memory or have
particular stories connected to them?” 53:03
When I think of Oklahoma, I think of the soil and the weather and how it was different
and some of the other states. Virginia, the natural bridge and the places I saw that I
wouldn’t have seen in my life, stood out to me. Ball playing, it was just exciting to play
at night and to have the fans come. They always hung around and wanted autographs,
but we couldn’t talk too long because we had to get to the bus and take our showers and
get onto the next bus. I can tell you a story about the Cuban girls when we would come
to the showers they wouldn’t shower with the rest of us, so they wanted to shower last
and they did. So, we’re sitting on the bus starving, hungry and we wanted to get moving
and they come lumbering along like this after making us wait forty-five more minutes.
Oh, you would say things to them, but you couldn’t say too much, but that was kind of
funny. Different cultures and different ways of getting things done. 54:09
Interviewer: “Did you always play each other or did you sometimes play local
teams?”
We always played each other when we were on tour because you took the girls that they
were going to use later on to see who worked out after these games and take up to the
other teams, so it was always each other and we never played outside of that.
Interviewer: “Aside from the Cubans, were there particular players in that group
who were particularly distinctive or were troublemakers or leaders or anything like
that?”
8
�Well, not any of that really, but different ones had different personalities. I don’t know if
you’re familiar with Maybelle Blair, there were girls like that, younger, that were very
funny and talked loud and did funny things. 54:57
Interviewer: “Now, was Toni Palermo in that group?”
Yes, she was in that group also, right.
Interviewer: “She would have been one of the youngest ones.”
Yes, she was maybe sixteen when I was seventeen or something.
Interviewer: “What did they do to look after you? You’re taking a group of teen
age, largely teenage, girls, I guess some of them were a little older, how did they look
after them?”
Well, the chaperones were always there. Wherever we stayed they were ever present in
the hotel and they just in general watched out for us because if some of these boys want
to take you out on a date or something, you would have to go through the chaperone.
That lightened up though because when I was in Grand Rapids one of the reporters from
the Grand Rapids Herald and I went out to dinner one night. His name was Scotty
something and I don’t remember the last name, but he was telling me about the morgue.
You know what the morgue is don’t you? Newspapers that they keep, so if somebody
dies they go into that file and pick it out, and that was something I never knew before and
something I learned from Scott. 56:00
Interviewer: “Now, does the traveling team season end before the regular one does?
Was it a shorter season or did you finish at the same time maybe, what do you
think?”
We finished in late August and what did our girls have, a 160 game schedule?
9
�Interviewer: “Something like that.”
It was something like that, but I don’t remember.
Interviewer: “The playoffs for the league were a little bit later than that. Would
any of the girls from the traveling teams be called up to the regular clubs or would
you just stay together the whole year?”
We stayed together the whole year and then they sent you to the club. No, they waited
until the season was over. They didn’t pull anybody out that I recall. We picked some up
on the road though; we picked up Sue Kidd in Choctaw, Arkansas.
Interviewer: “Was that a common thing? Would they try people out as they went
from town to town?” 56:57
I only remember that year picking her up as one particular person, but maybe they did,
maybe any of the girls that played in the fifties, maybe they picked up more than one.
Has anyone told you a story so far that they picked up someone?
Interviewer: “ I think there were some maybe they identified and may have joined
a little later. I think Sue Kidd did kind of get on the bus and go with them.”
She got on the bus and went with them, that’s absolutely right.
Interviewer: “Alright, they did that and once that season comes to an end—had you
finished high school yet or were you still in school?”
No, I hadn’t finished yet, but then you’d go back to school and once you were eighteen
and out, you went back two months to the job, if you had a job. Do you know what the
salaries for factory jobs were at the time?
Interviewer: “Nope”
10
�Forty a week—we got more playing ball, and some ladies will say they made more
money than their fathers. It’s kind of amazing isn’t it when you think of it? 57:56
Interviewer: “Although if you think of modern pro athletes in a lot of sports and so
forth, that seems less surprising, but then, baseball players were not paid as well as
football or anyone else.”
Well, back in the seventies, I knew a Jimmy French who was with the Washington
Senators when Ted Williams was the manager and these guys would get about fifteen a
day for meals when they were out and they all lived on hamburgers so they could save
money and it’s kind of interesting, I was down in Florida one time on vacation, and in a
bar. I came with two friends, and we wanted to go to the games, the spring training
games, and we found out where the fellas hung out, so we went in the bar and I was kind
of looking for Jimmy French because I had met him on the farm in Pennsylvania--Eastern
Ohio, right next to Pennsylvania and I said, “Anybody here know Jimmy French?” And
one of the guys said, “Hell, who doesn’t know Jimmy French? He’s the only one with a
masters degree in finance”. 59:00 He ended up working on the San Francisco stock
market. That was kind of rare I guess for athletes to be going to get a degree and then
playing ball, and they only had to play ten years to be pensioned, so every year—I don’t
know if he still gets ten thousand a year or what, but that was back from the early
seventies.
Interviewer: “Now we’re going to go back to your story. Did they want you to come
back the next year?”
Yeah
Interviewer: “But you decided not to.”
11
�I just decided I could make more money because I wanted to go to college and my family
didn’t have any money to send me, so—and I think because I’d had a paper route and I
was used to picking up spare money, I kind of knew how to do that, so when it was
available to me, it would be foolish not to take it, that’s the way I looked at it.
Interviewer: “So, you got the double salary while playing in Chicago and working,
right?”
Three years, right
Interviewer: “You did that in 1950 and then in 1951 you go back to the all
American?” 60:00
Yeah, I go back for a year because this team was moving on and another team didn’t
want to pick me up until the year after, so that’s what I did. It was because I was rookie
on this team and this team was the Chicago Queens, they won the championship that
year. I don’t know if you’ve heard of them. Have you heard of the Weaver sisters?
Interviewer: “Yeah”
They were on that team and I was the youngest one on the team and one was pitching and
one was playing shortstop. They could hit—they came out of New Orleans Jacks teams,
so I had people like that around me with high skill levels, and some of the best pitchers in
that league. Connie Wisnwiewski came to that league, and I know her because she came
to the Grand Rapids Chicks, and she got a higher salary than the rest. It was like three
hundred a week, which was very high and she made her own rules, she had a limousine
drive her around, but then she bounced back after that, so I wasn’t the only one that did
that. 1:01
Interviewer: “Normally what position would you play when you were playing?”
12
�Center field when I played for the Bluebirds, center field for the Grand Rapids Chicks,
and second base when I played for the Sallies.
Interviewer: “Was that just depending who else was on the team, where to put
you?”
Well, the coaches put you, they place you and you could be an infielder or an outfielder.
Interviewer: “Now did you play any positions beside those two?”
No, pretty much those two, and I liked center because I was pretty fast and I could cover
the other people over on those ends, so it worked well for me.
Interviewer: “Did you have a good throwing arm?”
I threw people out at the plate from center field.
Interviewer: “Could you hit?”
Fairly well, not real good, but I was a pretty good base stealer when I got on. I hear Toni
saying she was on base a lot and that’s kind of amazing to me, but you know and he said,
“don’t let the truth get in the way of anything.” 2:00
Interviewer: “She was on base all the time, she said.”
According to her, yeah and you got to love her. “What was your average? Were you
batting three hundred? Because we know that girls that batted three hundred and you
weren’t one of them.” You know who they were don’t you? Doris Sams, the ones they
named, people have already named the better players right? So Doris Sam’s, Connie
Wisnwiewski, and I can’t even think of the others right now, but-Interviewer: “She may have walked a lot.”
That could have been, that might have been.
13
�Interviewer: “Alright, so as someone who ran bases a lot, did you have problems
with strawberries and all of that?”
Yeah
Interviewer: “Did you find ways of dealing with that? Could you slide in a certain
way that was less harmful?”
No, when you hit the ground you’re going to land on the same spot the next time and you
remember that because it’s not comfortable.
Interviewer: “What kind of treatment could they provide for you?”
The chaperone came out right away and rolled you over and first cleaned it off and then
the Mercurichrome and of course, we never complained about anything because they
would take you out of the line-up and I did not want to be taken out of the line-up. 3:08
The ball player today, when they get a hangnail they don’t play and they get all that
money.
Interviewer: “Well, they want to protect their investment, right?”
It cracks me up
Interviewer: “So, basically you’re situation in Chicago changes, but you still want
to keep playing, so did you have to go tryout for the all Americans in 1951?”
No, when I said I wanted to come back they said, “oh good”, and they put me on a team.
Interviewer: “Alright, what do you remember about the season in Grand Rapids?”
I remember getting on base in Grand Rapids and sort of outwitting the Cuban pitchers for
stealing. I knew their little slow moves and whatever and throwing people out, and then
the people I met, so that was the best for me.
14
�Interviewer: “Were their some pitchers that were harder to run on than others?”
3:59
Yes, tough to run on
Interviewer: “Who was tough?”
Well, Jean Faut, of course, and I can’t think of any right now, I’m just not pulling them
up.
Interviewer: “And their pitchers that you really didn’t like to have to bat against?”
Well, you couldn’t control it, you did your best you know, you never gave up, never give
up.
Interviewer: “Where did you live when you were in Grand Rapids?”
In a home with somebody, and I don’t even remember the people's name right now, but I
lived in a sort of a boarding house situation once too.
Interviewer: “Do you remember which field you were playing at? South Field by
the high school or Bigelow Field south of town?”
I think it was Bigelow Field.
Interviewer: “They played there for a couple of years and then it burned down.
Were the crowds good in Grand Rapids at that point?” 4:55
Yes they were, that was five years in and they were still good. It was the last two or three
years that they weren’t so good and I don’t if it was a novelty and it was wearing off with
people, but it was kind of sad to see it go. Some of the girls, what you call the all stars
went on to play in other places around the country with Bill Allington and things like
that, so that was good.
Interviewer: “They did a little more barnstorming for a while anyway.”
15
�Yeah, a little more barnstorming, but that’s all that was left. I remember that wrestling
came into popularity then and girls roller skating came into popularity, so I don’t want to
call the American public fickle, but they tire of things after while and the guys were back,
so that was a big thing.
Interviewer: “That’s right because when the league started the minor leagues were
pretty well shut down, so in these smaller towns and so forth, they didn’t have
anything going on. 5:50
Sometimes—let’s see, it was when you’d go down to Florida and Max Carey was down
there and he’s invite some of us girls to the track to bet on the dogs, he always wanted
fifty cents, he was going to go in on it with two or three of us, kind of interesting huh?
Interviewer: “So you play basically with Grand Rapids for one year and then what
do you do after that?”
After that I go to college.
Interviewer: “Where did you go to college?”
I went to Northeastern Illinois State in Chicago, a city college.
Interviewer: “And what did you study?”
Education and Psychology
Interviewer: “Then what did you do with the degree once you had it?”
I was an elementary teacher for six years and then after that I was a counselor for twentyeight years.
Interviewer: “Where did you work?”
First in Chicago and then after a year the Department of Defense started in New York and
came across the country all the way to California, and they were interviewing for jobs in
16
�Europe at the army schools, so they picked me in Chicago and I went over to Europe for
two years and taught in Germany. 7:00 When I came back form there—you could look
for placements over there is you were deciding to come home and I found one in Parma,
Ohio, so I was there for two years and then I decided I wanted to work on my masters and
then I came back to Chicago. So, my career is in education.
Interviewer: “Aside from getting you some funding to start college with, what kind
of effects, do you think, playing organized ball for the all Americans and the softball
league, what sort of effects did that have on you?”
Well, the camaraderie is just so much you know, I think you’re so lucky to get that in
your life, but also, you’re around all these other women of talent, you supported each
other, you had role models because the girls that came before us were certain role models
you know. That Wagner lady, Audrey Wagner, ended up being a doctor and things like
that. The role models—“there isn’t anything you can’t do, at least give it a try”. 8:07 I
don’t think a lot of kids grow up with that, you have these other things that lead you to it,
these other opportunities and that’s what I think is the important thing, the opportunity
and then to be lucky enough to be in the right place at the right time with the right set of
skills.
Interviewer: “When you were actually playing with the league, did you see yourself
at all as any kind of pioneer and really doing something significant in moving
women’s sports?”
No, just doing what I loved to do, being physical in space and doing it well and all the
other benefits that I’ve suggested.
17
�Interviewer: “Then in the seventies and in the eighties as women’s sports really
start to pick up and title nine comes in and so forth, did you pay much attention to
that?” 8:52
Yeah, I remember people in—all the PE teachers in the school were into this Title IX
thing and all of us ladies were and I was a counselor in school, so we were always
politicking for that to come into being, because it made a difference. Look at our athletes
today—all as a result of Title IX. I know all the little particulars and the politics of it—
not that many girls care and not that many girls want to come out and they’re taking
space from the boys, but I think that gave America a boost now too. Our female athletes
and all the things they’ve won, we beat China in the Olympics, things like that. Look at
the women athletes in anything today, how good they are, and they have the same
training, they do the workouts. What we did was calisthenics and running, we didn’t do
weight work and you know how strong that enables you to be, so that’s why the women
are so good today. The women’s teams are as good as us or better, but the interest is not
there because you see, it’s society, it’s always the men with the bib basketball and the big
baseball and it’s understandable, that’s where the money goes, that’s where everything is.
10:03 I always thought sports in America was a great outlet for men in a progressive
nature. Let’s use their testosterone and I always thought, this is good because people
aren’t fighting in society themselves or fighting on the streets, they’re getting rid of it in
some other way and they’re getting rich too
Interviewer: “That’s true and we’re not like the European soccer fans where all the
violence is in the stands.”
We have our heroes, we sure do.
18
�Interviewer: “Were you involved in any of the stuff leading into the creation of “A
League of Their Own” and all that?”
Yes, right from the beginning. People that remember people, remember where they live,
“oh, she’s here”, and I got a call from Shirley Jamison, one of the first, and she was a tiny
little lady the first three, four or five years and in fact that was the first pictorial section
that came out in the newspaper, she was in that picture and of course years later, Isabel
came out in one while she was a pitcher. 10:58 Shirley called me up and said, “I know
where she’s living”, and then they told me . I went to Cooperstown in 1988 and it all
kicked off from there.
Interviewer: “The people you worked with and your friends, did they know you
played ball?”
I never told them, never talked about it.
Interviewer: “Even while you’re kind of lobbying for women in sports?”
Yeah, isn’t that interesting, it was just that part of my life is the way I looked at it you
know. Parts of it were wonderful for me and gave me an impetus to do things. I can tell
you a story—kind of an impetus to do things—I saw a movie when I was younger Roz
Russell played Amelia Earhart in the movie and what was I, in my teens when I saw that
or ten years old? Anyway, when I was forty years old, some kids in school came and
asked me if I would sponsor a flying club, just asked me. I said, “Oh sure”, so that
summer I said, “Oh my god, I better get a pilot's license, so that’s when I went to get a
pilots license because I wanted their respect, I wanted to know more than them, so they
would—just didn’t have someone who was just kind of a face to their thing, I wanted to
know the stuff. 12:06 Then I flew for five years on a regular basis and the guys that
19
�trained me said, “Ilene, you keep coming out, why?” I said, “I love being in the air, it’s
marvelous”, because he said that most women get their ticket and you never see them
again, they just want to say they have a pilots license. I didn’t know that until the
instructor told me that’s what most of the guys do it, but I guess we ladies are a little
more serious about it, we’re just glad to be there in the first place. 12:34
Interviewer: “And do you think that having gone and just done the stuff you had
done by taking on new challenges, it was no big deal to go fly?”
Yes, exactly, plus I had that interest since I was maybe fifteen or sixteen. If Amelia
Earhart can do it, I can do it. That’s so funny isn’t it? People need role models, boys and
girls both need role models and I had my role models in the girls that played ball and that
movie. In fact, that was the first role model to me, before I went with the girls to play
ball, you know, for something to do or that looks interesting, that I want to try.
Interviewer: “Well it makes for a good story and I’ll point out to you, you took
longer than fifteen minutes to tell it.”
I did? How long did I talk?
Interviewer: “I don’t know.”
A half hour, my times up—I’m usually worth a half hour. 13.23
Interviewer: “You’ve done really well, so thank you for coming and talking to us.”
Thank you.
20
�21
�22
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
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All-American Girls Professional Baseball League Interviews
Creator
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Grand Valley State University. History Department
Description
An account of the resource
The All-American Girls Professional Baseball League was started by Philip Wrigley, owner of the Chicago Cubs, during World War II to fill the void left by the departure of most of the best male baseball players for military service. Players were recruited from across the country, and the league was successful enough to be able to continue on after the war. The league had teams based in Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana and Michigan, and operated between 1943 and 1954. The 1954 season ended with only the Fort Wayne, South Bend, Grand Rapids, Kalamazoo, and Rockford teams remaining. The League gave over 600 women athletes the opportunity to play professional baseball. Many of the players went on to successful careers, and the league itself provided an important precedent for later efforts to promote women's sports.
Source
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<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/484">All-American Girls Professional Baseball League Collection, (RHC-58)</a>
Rights
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<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Subject
The topic of the resource
Sports for women
World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American
All-American Girls Professional Baseball League--Personal narratives
Oral history
Baseball players--Minnesota
Baseball players--Indiana
Baseball players--Wisconsin
Baseball players--Michigan
Baseball players--Illinois
Baseball for women--United States
Publisher
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Grand Valley State University Libraries, Special Collections and University Archives, 1 Campus Drive, Allendale, MI, 49401
Identifier
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RHC-58
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video/mp4
application/pdf
Type
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Moving Image
Text
Language
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eng
Date
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2017-10-02
Contributor
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Smither, James
Boring, Frank
Relation
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Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Oral History
A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Identifier
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RHC-58_EGascon1135BB
Title
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Gascon, Eileen "Ginger" (Interview transcript and video), 2010
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Gascon, Eileen "Ginger"
Description
An account of the resource
Ginger Gascon was born in Chicago in 1931 and grew up playing softball. She played on softball teams used by the AAGPL as farm clubs while she was in highschool, then joined the Springfield Sallies for the league's barnstorming tour in 1949. She played professional softball in Chicago in 1950, then played for the Grand Rapids Chicks in 1951. She played both center field and second base. She later became an educator and was actively involved in promoting women's sports.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Smither, James (Interviewer)
Publisher
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Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives
Subject
The topic of the resource
Oral history
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Video recordings
All-American Girls Professional Baseball League--Personal narratives
Baseball for women--United States
Baseball
Sports for women
World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American
Baseball players--Michigan
Baseball players--Illinois
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Type
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Moving Image
Text
Relation
A related resource
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2010-08-06
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/484">All-American Girls Professional Baseball League Collection, (RHC-55)</a>
Format
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application/pdf
video/mp4
-
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/71f5b60d70673a09dbede19ead918b42.mp4
87c7beb1afa3b92be3dc8df0bdcfcd3e
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/4ec3ce5a7399af1d8f98be0ee376aef1.pdf
c26cbf6ecb0d4926a633784494254574
PDF Text
Text
ORAL HISTORY INTERVIEW
JOAN HOLDERNESS
Women in Baseball
Born: Kenosha, Wisconsin, March 17, 1933
Resides:
Interviewed by: Frank Boring, GVSU Veterans History Project, August10, 2010, Detroit,
MI at the All American Girls Professional Baseball League reunion.
Transcribed by: Joan Raymer, February 6, 2011
Interviewer: “What is your full name and where and when were you born?”
I was born on March 17th, 1933 in Kenosha, Wisconsin.
Interviewer: “And your full name?”
Joan Holderness
Interviewer: “What was your early childhood like?”
I can recall that my dad played a lot of ball and my grandfathers both played and they
used to go out to the lake when I was a little tot, so I played ball all the time. I had a bat
and a ball and they had those flat gloves and I can remember doing that as a little kid.
The first time I heard about the league was when my mother took me to a ball game of
the Kenosha Comets with a friend of hers, and man, I just loved that. 43:11
Interviewer: “About how old were you when you saw them?”
I was probably in the fifth or sixth grade. From then on I wanted to be one of them, but
my mother was very strict and I didn’t go to any more ball games until I got into junior
high and I use to go down and watch them practicing. We could sit in the left field free
as fans, so I got to meet several of the ball players and they would play catch with or me.
44:05 In 1947 I was fourteen years old and they asked me if I wanted to be their batgirl.
They didn’t have batgirls, so I got a uniform and I was a batgirl, and of course, I was with
them in town I’d see them.
1
�Interviewer: “So, you were going to school and then during the summer is when
you would be a batgirl?”
Yes
Interviewer: “Did they pay you?”
No
Interviewer: “But you got a uniform?”
Yeah, in 1948 they started a farm system for the league and they played in Chicago and
my dad agreed that he would drive me down there once a week to play. They had four
teams, so I got to play. 45:14 I played shortstop and I really loved that, but we had to
drive all the way to Chicago and there were no Interstates or anything, but you would get
there and get into the game right away. I enjoyed that for the whole year in 1948. In
1949 they invited me to go to spring training in Indiana, so I went to spring training and I
ended up getting a contract and my dad signed my contract. 46:01
Interviewer: “Because you were underage.”
Oh, yeah
Interviewer: “How old were you?”
In 1949 I was sixteen, but my mother wouldn’t let me travel. Half of that year I
couldn’t—I could go to Racine, and I think that’s the only place she would let me go, so
how are you going to get on a team when you can’t go on the road, so it was tough for me
to get on the team and on a position. They liked me and they were very nice with me.
Anyway, in 1950 I played quite a bit. They use to put me as a pinch hitter a lot and I
played right field once in a while, but they had established some players that wouldn’t
give up their spots, so it was tough. 47:08 About in July of 1950 Grand Rapids needed a
2
�player in right field and I guess—Johnny Rawlings was the coach and he had watched me
when I was practicing with them and I had a good arm and so they wanted me to go to
Grand Rapids. Well, Grand Rapids was in town playing at Kenosha and when they were
leaving Kenosha they went to Racine, so they brought me up to Racine with my mother
and my mother was sitting and talking with the chaperone. Then they brought a girl
down that I was going to room with and they met her mother and so my mother finally let
me go. 48:11 Then I got to play all the time, but every night in right field, so I really
loved playing for them. I really enjoyed playing with the Chicks. And that was a lot of
nice girls.
Interviewer: “What was your—now you’re living in a house or something during
the season? You’re not living at home anymore right, for the Grand Rapids
Chicks? Where did you live when you were playing for Grand Rapids where were
you living?”
We were first in a home with a family and we just had a room. We couldn’t cook there
or anything. We could wash clothes, but we couldn’t cook or anything, so it was just a
place we could sleep. 49:08 We had twin beds and it was a nice place, and nice people.
Interviewer: “Was that your first time living away from home?”
Oh yeah
Interviewer: “By that time you were maybe seventeen or eighteen?”
That was in 1950, so I was seventeen. We ended up getting an apartment and that was
nice because we could cook and everything and it didn’t cost so much. I couldn’t go to a
lot of restaurants because I wasn’t old—if they had any booze they wouldn’t let you in
and they always had the best cooks.
3
�Interviewer: “How were you as a hitter?”
How was I? I don’t remember striking out, but I think they got a couple places where I
struck out, but I don’t remember striking out. 50:17 I wasn’t a three hundred hitter or
anything, but I was good at meeting the ball.
Interviewer: “How about strawberries? Did you slide into bases at all?”
Not real good. Too many legs you know, but I did all right, I didn’t like sliding.
Interviewer: “Did you think, at that time, that you were going to continue playing
baseball as a professional? You were sixteen, seventeen, years old, were you
thinking about playing?” 51:15
I played 1951, but I felt like the league was kind of busting up. Kenosha let their team
travel all the time and a couple tournaments they were going to different teams and Grand
Rapids was losing their fans. They just—they had other things to do then. They had
gasoline and they could go where they wanted to go, but we had some nice crowds for a
while, especially in Grand Rapids. Rockford was a nice place and Fort Wayne had good
fans. 52:11
Interviewer: “What were your plans in terms of—were you going to go to college or
did you think going into the work world or were you going to get married? What
were you thinking about?”
Well, I was planning on going to school, but I never did. When I went back home I had
to go back into school and some teachers didn’t like that I left early to go to spring
training and when I came back they wouldn’t let me make up my studies, so I had
problems with them. I ended up—I didn’t graduate when I was supposed to graduate, so
I was disgusted with that, so I ended up going back and getting a job with the
4
�government. 53:06 Then I didn’t want to go back to play ball anymore. It was hard to
get a job with the government and I worked at Great Lakes.
Interviewer: “Did you make the decision not to play anymore?”
Yeah, they called me the next year, but I decided not to play. I couldn’t because I didn’t
want to leave that job and my dad had signed for me to get a car, so I had to pay for the
car, so I couldn’t quit the job.
Interviewer: “Did you miss it?”
Well yeah, I did miss it and the first couple years I really did, but after that-Interviewer: “How did you find out that the league had folded? Do you remember
how you found out?” 54:07
Well, the last year I played a lot of the teams were busting down you know. They were
running out of money and they were losing money and they just quit. The girls had to go
to other teams and it was just traveling, traveling. Buses bothered me; I got tired of bus
rides. I didn’t ride a bus for a long time, many years, I was sick of them.
Interviewer: “After you quit the league, did you ever talk to people after that, years
later did you ever talk about the fact that you played professional baseball?”
Not really, we didn’t discuss it. No, sometimes I would see the girl that I was living with.
She got married and she would have a child, every year she would have a child. 55:14 I
would see her and I was bowling quite a bit and I would meet several of the girls that
were ball players and were bowling, so I got to see some of them, but I really didn’t—I
loved playing baseball, and I’ve been a Cubs fan all my life. I just—it was done you
know.
5
�Interviewer: “Now, you’re at a reunion after many, many years, what prompted
you to come to a reunion?”
Oh, to see people. I went to the first one in Chicago and to see everybody again was
really great and we had a lot of fun. 56:10 We got to play golf and whatever, so it was
fun
Interviewer: “What was your reaction to getting into the Baseball Hall of Fame?”
Oh, I thought it was great that they accepted our league. At the time I was a computer
worker with the government and I built a database for the league and I helped
Cooperstown to get all the names up, and that was nice to find everybody.
Interviewer: “Did you go to the Hall of Fame?”
Oh yeah, I’ve been there two or three times.
Interviewer: “Did you go there when they actually had the opening ceremony?”
Yeah
Interviewer: “What was that like?” 57:04
That was super and when they opened that curtain, oh, we were all excited and I took a
lot of movies of that.
Interviewer: “Did you see the movie, A League of Their Own?”
Did I see it? Oh yeah, I’ve seen it a lot of times.
Interviewer: “What did you think of that?”
I thought she did a great job. There was a lot of Hollywood stuff in there, but I thought
she did a wonderful job, and everybody I talk to about it today, people say they have seen
that movie so many times, not the players or fans, just people.
Interviewer: “I’ve seen it maybe five or six times myself.”
6
�It’s on TV quite a bit, so they really enjoy that movie.
Interviewer: “Do you think the movie, the movie itself when it came out, did that
get you thinking more about your time in baseball or were you already thinking
about the baseball anyway?” 58:14
At the time it came out I was president of the association, so I was pretty excited for
everybody and I think Penny did a wonderful job. I met her in Chicago and I met a
couple of the stars, Rosie and Madonna, they were there, so I got them, but I thought
Penny did a wonderful job with it. She had a couple of our girls there helping her.
Interviewer: “Were you at all surprised at the big—this huge outpouring of
affection for your league that didn’t really happen before that, right? Before the
movie?” 59:13
They didn’t know about us, they just—of course the girls were from all around us, east
and west, but the league itself played right in the Midwest. People just didn’t know about
us, they just didn’t know about our league.
Interviewer: “Were you surprised at this? It’s big, and you probably didn’t think
it was going to be this big when you were playing ball. Were you surprised at how
big it’s become?”
I think I am, yeah, I think it’s wonderful, especially for kids, they just think it’s
wonderful and they wish they could play. It’s surprising they are so happy.
Interviewer: “Do you think that the fact that you played, that the league played,
had an affect on young people, on young girls? Do you think there was an
inspiration from what you did?”
7
�Perhaps, yeah and they realize that women can play in sports and I think that helped a lot
of people. Tennis was wonderful for women and they just went for everything, soccer,
it’s great, and a lot of ball players are out there, I just don’t see them that much. I don’t
see them anymore, but I know there’s a lot of them playing ball. :55
Interviewer: “Were there any particular games or events that happened during
your playing that stand out? A home run or stealing a base?”
No, I didn’t make it—I had a triple once and I got to third base and I couldn’t go any
farther. I told John, “I guess I wasn’t breathing when I was running across there”, but he
was motioning me to go home and I couldn’t make it. That was in Fort Wayne and that
was funny, but he was mad that I didn’t go.
Interviewer: “How did the manager treat you?”
Every manager I had was very good. Johnny Gottselig from Chicago, he was a hockey
player and I never thought about him as a baseball player, but he was nice. 2:00
Interviewer: “Did the managers treat you like a woman or did they treat you like a
ball player?”
Both I guess, yeah. John was wonderful, John Rawlings. I’d be in the field and he’d be
standing—you know when you’re warming up prior to the game, and he would hit a fly
ball and then he’s hit two ground balls to right field and he’d put his bat down near the
ground and that’s what he wanted, for me to throw that ball right at that bat and man, I
would make him move it because I had a good arm. He thought that was funny, the way
I could hit—that I could throw that ball so well, but I could do anything for that guy, he
was great. I really enjoyed playing for him. 3:03
8
�Interviewer: “Some of the other girls said that they knew how to play baseball from
playing on their own or playing with neighbors and things like that, but the
managers taught them specific things that professionals knew. Did that, did they
teach you certain things that you didn’t know before, on how to play better?”
Well, I think John did if we were in the infield or whatever, he would—don’t take steps
and things like that or how to be in position to flip. My dad taught me a lot about
throwing from the field, my hand close to my head. I had a good arm. 4:00
Interviewer: “Were you playing the standard baseball when you played, or was it
the larger baseball?”
It was overhand when I played, but it wasn’t down to a nine inch, which they ended up
with I guess. I think we were around ten or nine and three quarters or something. It was
a good fast ball and it was—I thought it was a good game because it was fast.
Interviewer: “What did you think of the uniforms?”
The uniforms didn’t bother me, but you know, it was kind of wide at the bottom and I’d
cut mine down a little bit. I had long legs, but I didn’t flip them out you know, but they
were ok, and they never bothered me. 5:12
Interviewer: “Looking back on that period of time, how do you feel about that
period of your life?”
Oh, it was great, I was making about ninety dollars a week and that’s more than my dad
was making. When I think about when I went to a job with the government, I wasn’t
making nothing, it was terrible, but I spent over thirty years with the government and by
that time I got up a little bit. It was good money for a lot of the girls. A lot of them—a
lot of my friends went to school and it was great. 5:58
9
�Interviewer: “Did you help support your family when you were playing?”
Yeah, not that I wanted to, I was saving money so I could go to school and they needed
money for taxes, so in a couple years I lost it, so anyway-Interviewer: “How do you like the reunions?”
The reunions? Oh, they’re great, but we’ve lost so many girls now. Especially the last
couple of years ooh. When I was the president you know, I think I had gotten over five
hundred and seventy some players in the league, but we couldn’t find about a hundred
and thirty people, so I don’t know where they’re down to now. 6:57 Boy, it was tough
finding them.
Interviewer: “We’ve had the same problem trying to find you to be able to get an
interview with you, so I understand. It’s important that we get these, and I’m glad
you sat down with me. I did a wonderful interview with Beans Risinger and a
couple of weeks after that she went to Oklahoma and she passed away, but I got
calls from Cookie, I got calls from others saying they were so happy I got that.”
7:34
She was a wonderful gal.
Interviewer: “She was a wonderful gal.”
She was a good pitcher too.
Interviewer: “Yeah, and tall too.”
She was taller than me, that’s for sure.
Interviewer: “Were there very many tall girls like you? Because you’re big.”
I’m about five ten, but I Beanie was over six foot. Another girl from Duluth was about
six two or three. Barbara Rotvig, she died of Cancer when she was thirty-five years old
10
�and she was like a big sister to me. 8:11 I was the oldest in my family and I have two
sisters and a brother, but she was my big sister. She was a great pitcher too.
Interviewer: “When you first started in the league you were very, very young and
you were mentioning the chaperone. Were you carefully watched because of your
age?”
Oh yeah, especially when I went to Grand Rapids. If you wanted to date anybody, she
had to know and when you couldn’t go to these restaurants, you ate at the huddle house
or something. 9:14
Interviewer: “You can’t go where they serve alcohol, right?”
Yeah, it was terrible. We didn’t—the girl I was rooming with, she was only a year older
than I was, so we had to be careful what we were doing. She had a car and she was from
Chicago, so we had a good time.
Interviewer: “Whenever I get together with you, because I was in Milwaukee, we
were in Milwaukee doing interviews too, and you hear certain stories. What’s your
story? What’s the one you tell?” 9:55
I don’t really have any stories.
Interviewer: “Well, you hit a triple once you said.”
I can remember when I was at Kenosha, John would put me in as a pinch hitter and I
would get a hit and win the game and the fans went crazy you know and that was
wonderful. Two or three times that one year, so I remember those times, but it was a lot
of fun for me to play because I really enjoyed baseball. My brother didn’t like to play
ball. 10:51
11
�Interviewer: “You played, you said, with your father, right? Did you just play
catch or batting too?”
With my father, sometimes he would take me out and he would throw and if we would go
to the park he could hit a ton and I couldn’t find the ball you know. Yeah, he spent a lot
of time with me hitting balls. My mother was a pretty good athlete too and they didn’t
have a lot of organized leagues in Kenosha when I was a kid, but they did have about
four teams for the city and I ended up being a pitcher for softball and my mother was in
the backyard catching for me, but I don’t remember her going to the games. 11:53 My
dad would go to the ball games when we were in town, and my grandfather, my dad’s
father, he would come to the ball games if I was there. It was nice, but when you’re out
there you’re worried about if you’re going to throw the ball away or something in front of
them and I would worry about that. You know a lot of my friends were there and it was
embarrassing if you did something wrong, but I really enjoyed playing ball. 12:39
Interviewer: “Thank you very much.”
Well, thank you.
12
�13
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
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All-American Girls Professional Baseball League Interviews
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Grand Valley State University. History Department
Description
An account of the resource
The All-American Girls Professional Baseball League was started by Philip Wrigley, owner of the Chicago Cubs, during World War II to fill the void left by the departure of most of the best male baseball players for military service. Players were recruited from across the country, and the league was successful enough to be able to continue on after the war. The league had teams based in Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana and Michigan, and operated between 1943 and 1954. The 1954 season ended with only the Fort Wayne, South Bend, Grand Rapids, Kalamazoo, and Rockford teams remaining. The League gave over 600 women athletes the opportunity to play professional baseball. Many of the players went on to successful careers, and the league itself provided an important precedent for later efforts to promote women's sports.
Source
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<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/484">All-American Girls Professional Baseball League Collection, (RHC-58)</a>
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<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Subject
The topic of the resource
Sports for women
World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American
All-American Girls Professional Baseball League--Personal narratives
Oral history
Baseball players--Minnesota
Baseball players--Indiana
Baseball players--Wisconsin
Baseball players--Michigan
Baseball players--Illinois
Baseball for women--United States
Publisher
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Grand Valley State University Libraries, Special Collections and University Archives, 1 Campus Drive, Allendale, MI, 49401
Identifier
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RHC-58
Format
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video/mp4
application/pdf
Type
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Moving Image
Text
Language
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eng
Date
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2017-10-02
Contributor
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Smither, James
Boring, Frank
Relation
A related resource
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Oral History
A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Identifier
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RHC-58_JHolderness0369BB
Title
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Holderness, Joan (Interview transcript and video), 2010
Creator
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Holderness, Joan
Description
An account of the resource
Joan Holderness was born in Kenosha, Wisconsin, in 1933. She learned to play baseball from her father, and after the Kenosha Comets came to town, she started going to their games and became their bat girl, and was recruited to join the team as an outfielder in 1949, even though her mother would not let her travel farther than Racine for road games. The next year, she got to play full time, and was traded to Grand Rapids. She left the league after the 1950 season and took a regular job at the Great Lakes naval base in Illinois.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Boring, Frank (Interviewer)
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives
Subject
The topic of the resource
Oral history
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Video recordings
All-American Girls Professional Baseball League--Personal narratives
Baseball for women--United States
Baseball
Sports for women
World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American
Baseball players--Michigan
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Type
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Moving Image
Text
Relation
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Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2010-08-10
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/484">All-American Girls Professional Baseball League Collection, (RHC-55)</a>
Format
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application/pdf
video/mp4
-
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/09534ac5cad0c3de04430a392a308d4b.m4v
34e524624d277662d6dc1c5934bc2b74
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/149a9b4cd9d722443da7e47d52fdd06f.pdf
de582ea70840b72f5d636aa3a16fa60b
PDF Text
Text
Grand Valley State University
All American Girls Professional Baseball League
Veterans’ History Project
Interviewee’s Name: Katie Horstman
Length of Interview: (01:08:34)
Interviewed by: Frank Boring, GVSU Veterans History Project, September 27, 2009,
Milwaukee, WI at the All American Girls Professional Baseball League reunion.
Transcribed by: Joan Raymer, May 20, 2010
Interviewer: “What is your name and where and when were you born?”
My name is Katherine Teresa Horstman known as Horsy or Katie and I go by the name
of Katie and I was born in Minster, Ohio on April 14, 1935.
Interviewer: “What was your early childhood like, before high school, in the early
days?”
The early days—I had five brothers, two sisters, born on a farm east of Minster, Ohio and
I’ll tell you, I had a lot of cows to milk every morning and that’s how I got my wrist
strength, so Jimmy Foxx said. I helped with the chores because my brothers all were in
service at one time, so the three girls had to help out with the farm work, help dad.
Interviewer: “So your dad was a farmer?”
Oh yes.
Interviewer: “A dairy farmer?”
We had everything. It was a hundred acres at that time, about a hundred acres it was all
small. Small town, German town, talked German, didn’t talk in English, I was brought
up speaking German. 1:19.
Interviewer: “So the early day before the war you had your brothers around you?”
They were all older I was the second youngest.
Interviewer: “Ok, so you didn’t play games with your brother—they were already
older.”
Except for one brother, John and he was a good ball player, but whenever I could,
whenever I didn’t have chores to do or anything, drive the tractor or whatever, John and I
would hit balls. We had a lot of neighbor kids and every Sunday it was known that we
would take turns going to each other’s houses and play baseball, not softball because the
boys didn’t want to play softball, we had to play baseball. 2:03 If you weren’t any good
you sat on the sidelines, but if you were good they asked you to play.
1
�Interviewer: “So did you sit on the sidelines?”
No way, no I was pretty good otherwise they wouldn’t let me play.
Interviewer: “In school were there any kinds of sports for girls?”
Not at all until—it was a Catholic community, 99.9 percent Catholic, and a young priest
came into town and he started the CYO, which was a Catholic Youth Organization. The
girls didn’t have anything and he felt sorry for us and he was a good ball player, so he
started it. We had softball, so I started in the sixth grade and ended up a freshman
because at fifteen years I was scouted by Fort Wayne, Indiana. 2:56
Interviewer: “We’re jumping too quickly—so he set up a softball team that was not
just for boys?”
No, not at all, they didn’t play softball they played baseball.
Interviewer: “So there was a softball girls team that you played on in high school?’
Exactly.
Interviewer: “Did you hear about out did you know about, for example,
professional men’s baseball? Were their newspapers that you red or radio?”
Oh my gosh, Wally Post is from around us, played for the Reds and Pete Rose was born
on April 14th, same as my birthday, so that was my hero, my idol.
Interviewer: “So you actually knew about baseball outside of just the people you
were playing with?” 3:39
Oh yeah.
Interviewer: “You followed the teams?”
Radio, we always had the Reds on—big Reds fans.
Interviewer: “When did you hear, I don’t mean the exact date or anything, but do
you remember when it was that you heard there was a women’s team?”
Well, in one of the papers, Dottie Schroeder was in the Sidney Daily News and said that
Charlie Grimm would pay her fifty thousand dollars if she was a man. I cut it out and I
had a little scrap book that I kept all the clippings in because we had a weekly paper, The
Minster Post, and they would always put the scores in and what we did, and I pasted
those in and I put Dottie’s picture right on the front and put under it, My Ambition, not
knowing, I was only fourteen then when I saw this picture in the paper, and I cut it out
and I always dreamt that hopefully I would meet her. 4:35
Interviewer: “So once you saw that picture, you cut it out and put it in your
scrapbook. When did the actual opportunity come up?”
2
�The next year—my father passed away that year, when I was fourteen, so I was tired of
milking the cows for my brother and the chickens and everything else that we had to do
and I thought—I just kept praying on the dream that I gotta find. So we were playing St.
Henry in Ohio in May during school time and a scout from Fort Wayne happened to be
there and he told the coach from St. Henry, “Hey, I think that girl can play ball and she
can play on the Fort Wayne Daisies team”, and he said, “who are the Fort Wayne
Daisies? He had never heard of Fort Wayne either or girls baseball, so his daughter was a
senior, so he said, “I would like to see those two try out for the Fort Wayne Daisies.”
5:45 He’s the one that took me after school was out, which was like May 23rd and we
went to Fort Wayne and I started pitching and infield practice. Max Carey was the coach,
hallo of famer, and he said, “Yes, you can stay”. 6:02
Interviewer: “What did your mom think about this?”
Well, I came home, I had to get clothes and stuff, and I told her about it and she said, “As
long as you go to church every Sunday you can go, but as soon as you don’t you’re back
here”, so I never missed a Sunday in my life because I always remember my mother, she
was very, very strict.
Interviewer: “What was the actual process? How did you get there and once you
got there what actually happened? I know you want to get into the game and all
that, but for our purposes we want to know the exact details.”
Okay, I was fifteen years old, I couldn’t drive, I didn’t have a car, my dad had passed
away, and nobody could take me except Tony Bernard, who was from St. Henry, the
coach, he took me and then I started and I had another roommate from Philadelphia and
we stayed in somebody’s home, you couldn’t stay in apartments, we always stayed in
private homes that wanted some ball players to stay with them. 7:16
Interviewer: “Did you sign a contract?”
Oh yeah.
Interviewer: “At fifteen?”
At fifteen I signed a contract. Fifty dollars, the rookies got fifty dollars a week, okay this
was great money since I was only making forty cents for mowing the neighbors’ lawn, an
acre. I could have cared less about the money I had no idea. I think the first year, until I
turned sixteen; I was paid under the table. They gave me cash because they weren’t
allowed to write out a check. 7:47
Interviewer: “So, had you traveled at all any distance before you went to Fort
Wayne?”
3
�Probably Dayton, Ohio was forty-five miles and that took an hour and a half in a 1936
Ford because I remember the escalator that’s all I remember. I had never been on an
escalator and I was petrified to go up that escalator and I finally did and it was okay.
Since we had chores, you had to be there, it was a responsibility and we didn’t know any
better and loved it as long as I could play for CYO once a week that was great to me and
I loved to hit. 8:29
Interviewer: “What was your first impression of Fort Wayne when you got there?”
Well, when I got there it was funny because Max Carey had me pitch right away. He
wanted to see my arm. Well, I had a pretty good arm and I was very accurate and I
pitched and pitched for at least thirty minutes batting practice and Lefty Alvarez was
picking up the balls and giving them to me and she was talking and I couldn’t understand
her and I thought, “what kind of a language is she talking and what am I getting into?”
She kept saying, “are you tired, are you tired, are you tired?” I thought, “gosh” and I
finally turned around and asked somebody because I couldn’t understand her and they
said she was saying, “are you tired”, and they said she was from Cuba. 9:16 I said,
“Cuba, where’s that? I had no idea. I really paid attention to the history lessons after
that.
Interviewer: “Did you feel at all intimidated at that age? Here’s these girls you
know who are playing professional ball.”
I was more intimidated by the big city life. That just threw me you know, all these cars
and all these people, I had no idea, but as far as playing ball, no, they were all very nice.
Dotty Schroeder was on that team, so I was happy, Jo Weaver, the sisters, Jean Weaver
and Betty, super nice because most of them came from farms like me, so I could
communicate and we talked farm life mostly and baseball and that’s all I remember.
10:09
Interviewer: “ Now rookies are usually treated like rookies, so how were you
treated when you first started?”
Not bad at all because they knew I had an arm and knew I could hit, so we had no
problems. Jo, Jeanne and I, there were four of us that were fifteen, sixteen years old and
that helped. With her sisters being older and Betty was a super player, and they played
two years before I did, Betty did, So she had the car and she took us all around and that’s
how I got my transportation. 10:54
Interviewer: “That must have been amazing to be with some players and one of
them has a car?”
I know, it was unreal, well she was making a hundred and some dollars a week and cars,
you could buy a band new car at the end of the season for two thousand five hundred, so
she always had a brand new car and a big one you know. We were in seventh heaven and
didn’t know it.
4
�Interviewer: “I know this is going back a long way, and I don’t want to jump ahead
too far, but what were the first few, say days or weeks like? You didn’t start
playing in a game right away did you?”
No, no.
Interviewer: “What were the first days kind of like?” 11:31
Just more or less getting acquainted with the girls and getting use to playing every day
and a regular schedule.
Interviewer: “What was the routine? I know it was different sometimes, but what
was the routine?”
The routine was that a four o’clock you would be at the ballpark and we would warm up
and stuff and seven o’clock was game time and the crowd would come in. Fort Wayne
had one of the biggest crowds in the whole league and then we would watch the game or
participate for the first couple of weeks or month. I didn’t play very much, but just
watched to see how everybody was playing their position. I was very versatile because I
could play outfield or whatever, but I never considered myself a pitcher because I didn’t
pitch underhand, I always threw overhand. 12:35
Interviewer: “At that time, when you first started, were they still pitching
underhand?”
No, no, in softball in the CYO, that’s the only position I never played. Just to get
acquainted with the bigger city and the fans and the rules, that’s what threw me, I
couldn’t believe the rules. Lipstick on every day all the time because the chaperone
would remind you and I mean she was strict, Tetzlaff from Wisconsin and every time we
would try to get out of it or something she would say, “Okay, either wear it or you get
fined”. The fine the first time was five dollars and then ten dollars and then twenty
dollars and then suspension, you were out and man, I didn’t want to go home. Although I
did get homesick and I was surprised, but you get over that. 13:32 I think my room
mate, Jeanne Geissinger, who was sixteen, she helped me a lot, we were both together
and like I said, the Weaver sisters really helped me.
Interviewer: “I’m kind of curious about this, had you worn lipstick before you had
gone into the league?”
No, you normally didn’t wear lipstick in our town until you were sixteen. Sixteen was
like a magic number, you could wear lipstick, you could have a date, you never dated
before and that was another thing because some guys would come up and ask me for a
date and I said, “well I don’t know, I have to ask the chaperone”, and she said, “Only if I
go along”. Go along, I thought, “wow” and I said, “No, I’ll wait until I’m sixteen”.
Interviewer: “Well, who taught you how to put lipstick on?”
5
�Well, I just did it you know. It wasn’t that hard and I thought it was amazing and then we
had curfew and I wasn’t use to that either because on the farm we went to these dances
and we had huge dance halls and we had Guy Lombardo, the Eagles and all and that was
very famous in our town, we had big dances. 14:46 So, I don’t know, I just got to learn
how to put lipstick on and everything and that was it.
Interviewer: “ What were some of the other things you had to do besides lipstick?
Did you have to wear your hair a certain way?”
It had to be a certain length. You couldn’t wear boyish hairdos. You had to be in two
hours on a road trip and that was another thing, we got to travel to Rockford, Illinois and
all these places, but if you got off the bus to get a coke, you had to put a skirt on. You
could wear shorts and slacks on the bus, and I thought--my god, we stopped at a little
town and I said, “who in the world is out here at two thirty in the morning? I don’t see
anybody”, and she said, “if you want to pay the five dollars, it’s up to you”. No way.
15:41
Interviewer: “Was there, when you first started, did they kind of sit you down, you
and a couple others, to kind of go through this little school—this is what you have to
do, you have to have on lipstick etc.?”
The chaperone did.
Interviewer: “So right away from the beginning they told you?”
Right away on the very first day.
Interviewer: “Okay, so like you said, there were certain rules and regulations and if
you didn’t you were fined.”
Yes, I told you what the rules were on that. Five, ten, twenty and suspension.
Interviewer: “How far did you get?”
Oh no, I paid attention believe me, I wanted to play ball. I did everything they said and
my mother would have been really proud of me because I would always question her.
16:31
Interviewer: “So let’s kind of put ourselves, you’re on the bench over the first
couple of weeks, watching and seeing how the game is being played, what was your
experience when you first got your opportunity to play?”
Well, the first opportunity I remember playing outfield, right field, and I think I pitched
too. I did real well in hitting and Max Carey liked the way I hit, so I played outfield and
I think I pitched the very first year too and I won three games. I pitched three games and
6
�won every one of them, so that was great. The next year Jimmy Foxx came in as our
manager in 1952 and he didn’t want me in the outfield. He thought I had super arms, so
he put me on third base in the infield and I really liked the infield. I moved around and
then he needed pitchers, so then I pitched and played third base. 17:35 I didn’t get a
day’s rest like these pitchers do now, I went right to third base, if he needed me I was
right there.
Interviewer: “Let’s stay in the first season, you got a chance to pitch and one of the
things I found from some of the interviews that I have done with the other players,
is when they became a rookie there was certainly the sense that they were the
rookie, but once you played and the other women saw you playing well, you no
longer were the rookie. Did you ever get the feeling or sense that you were no longer
the rookie?”
No, I guess it didn’t bother me.
Interviewer: “So you just wanted to play baseball?”
Exactly, that’s all I wanted to do. I just wanted to play ball. I was a pretty good punter in
football. 18:29
Interviewer: “You had played before with the Catholic Youth Group, but now
you’re playing in professional baseball and I would imagine there’s a few more fans
in the stands, how were the fans?”
Oh yeah, but we had a lot of fans in CYO. It was a small town and that’s all you had to
do in the evening, we always played at night, so people from work, this was there
entertainment. We had a semi-pro baseball team, boys, but they only played on Sundays,
so during the week we played and we drew a pretty big crowd. 19:00
Interviewer: “So you were used to the fans?”
Well not ten thousand like the fans they had
Interviewer: “Was that at all intimidating to you, the fact that there were that
many people?”
Not at all, I loved the fans. That’s why I liked third base because I could talk to them like
Rosie O’Donnell, I was one of those with the fans and I always loved to talk to them.
Interviewer: “How was that? I remember from the movie that happening, but did
you actually talk to people during the game?”
Not during the game, no, no, but right after or before mostly before and you would sign
autographs. You never refused because you knew they paid for your work. 19:52
7
�Interviewer: “Was there a mixture in the audience or was it mostly men or
women?”
Amazingly and what was amazing, lots of young men and that amazed me. Same thing
with these autograph sessions—that really amazes me—young man, what do you want
my old autograph for? Like I said today, lots of historians are young men and they
collect a lot of memorabilia.
Interviewer: “What were some of the highlights that you can remember from your
first season, the first time out?”
First season—well, that we were in the playoffs, we were in the play offs and so I had—
well, you know I was supposed to be back in school after Labor Day, that’s when school
started, so I thought that was going to be a big problem, but the superintendent liked me
and he said, “Oh well, women don’t ordinarily get an education anyhow, so you might as
well just go and as long as you have good grades”, and that was the thought because the
women over there hardly anybody went to college at that time. You’re talking about the
fifties and the philosophy over there was that women get married, have kids and are in
the kitchen making meals or working on the farm. 21:22
Interviewer: “But you got to play baseball.”
Yes I did.
Interviewer: “So the first season you did the playoffs. Did you play in the games?”
Oh Yeah, and I called the superintendent and he said to go ahead and he was really nice,
he understood, but I only missed like two weeks as long as I made it up, but then I came
back and spring training was like the first of May and we were going to Newton, North
Carolina in 1952. I approached him as soon as I found out, which was in February, and
he said, “Okay, this next semester, I notice your conduct is going down and if you can get
your conduct up you’re allowed to go”, so I had to button up a little. 22:21
Interviewer: “Shall we get into the conduct part of this or not?”
I was a prankster and I got that from my brother.
Interviewer: “So no more pranks?”
No, I was an angel believe me. It was hard but--Interviewer: “So the first season when you came back from playing, what was the
reaction, you say it was a small town, what was the reaction from your family, from
the town, were you treated differently?”
Well, in a way I was and they were very happy because after that we had spring training
and the teams came through, like I said, that one night with Kenosha, Wisconsin and Fort
Wayne released me to play with them and I pitched in front of my home town and we had
8
�three thousand people and our town was only two thousand five hundred, so the
neighboring people came and baseball was very popular. My brother played for Minster,
so we played against each other one time. 23:22 They treated me perfect and I was a
star.
Interviewer: “So you got past the rookie status even though you didn’t feel that
way, but you got past that and now we’re going into 1952 and it’s your second
season. Tell us about that, was there anything different about coming to play”
Oh yeah, we heard that Jimmy Foxx was the manager, the Jimmy Foxx, he was like Babe
Ruth and we thought wow, you know we’re playing under this guy? He was super nice
just unbelievable, he couldn’t believe it that the girls were so good and coming from him
you had to be pretty good. He was just—he was like a second dad to me, we really
clicked and he brought me in from outfield and he said, “you’re going to play third base
because you got that arm and that long distance”, so I had accuracy, that was the biggest
thing and then he was running out of pitchers and they didn’t have savers or what they
have now days, and so I would also pitch and because I had accuracy and fast ball was
my main pitch. 24:58
Interviewer: “Tell us about being the pitcher, what was the strategy there? Did you
have many different types of throws?”
No, I didn’t have very many—I didn’t have a curve ball, knuckle ball or anything like
that. All I had was a fast ball and then I found out from the other pitchers that if you
slowed it down a little, different speeds, change up would throw the batters off, which I
noticed some did because we had a lot of good pitchers and if they changed up, my gosh,
you were way ahead waiting for that fast ball to come in and you would strike out. I tried
it and it really worked for me and also my catcher was very, very intelligent, she knew all
of the players and what they liked—inside ball, outside ball and since I was so accurate,
because I had really worked on accuracy, I think I hit one person ever and I felt so bad I
never threw another inside pitch. 26:04 That was mostly it and I think my ERA speaks
for itself because I think I only lost two games the second year.
Interviewer: “Was there a difference, in terms of your playing, between the first
manager and then when Jimmy came in, did you feel that you played better?”
I played better because Jimmy was a hitter and I loved to hit the ball. I remember one
time I was up to the plate and he said, “Gosh, did you live on a farm and milk cows?” I
thought, “Wow, does it show?” I was thinking about smelling the manure and all that
and thought, “wow” and he said, “no, because I was on a farm and you got a wrist action
like a farmer”, like milking cows because that’s where I got my wrist action. 27:00 I
thought, “way to go”, and I hated to milk those cows and here it was the greatest thing I
ever did. I’ll never forget that though because I looked at him and I thought, “wow”, I
thought maybe I looked like a farmer, I didn’t know.
9
�Interviewer: “Did he actually show you specific things to do that maybe you had
not done before, techniques and things like that?”
He just told me that I was a natural, a natural hitter and my last—1954 I was only
eighteen or nineteen years old and I was batting three twenty eight and that was my final
batting average. 27:41
Interviewer: “52”, are there any highlights that you can think of? You mentioned
having a new manager and that was a big thing, but in terms of plays, in terms of
games you may have played, is there anything that sticks out from that year?”
I played more, I played a lot of games, I was in every game, except when I pitched, and
normally he gave me a night or two off. I also played different positions if somebody got
hurt, like second base, he would put me in or first base, whatever-- because again, we
heard rumors that pretty soon there wouldn’t be girls baseball, but we just thought they
were rumors because Fort Wayne did real well, but South Bend, Studebaker went out, so
they were no longer there and that really affected the crowds in South Bend. 28:34
Interviewer: “We’ll get back there in a minute, but I want to get back to the idea
that Jimmy was having you go to different position. Was that unusual? Did all of
the girls have that ability—just put them here, put them there?”
A few, just a very few. Most of them just had their regular positions, like Dotty
Schroeder, she would always play shortstop. I never saw her play any other position.
Willy Briggs, left field, Tybee Eisen, center field—the outfielders were sort of set.
Interviewer: “You were kind of, for Jimmy anyway, if he really needed somebody.”
Oh yeah, he could rely on me and besides he didn’t like me on the bench. 29:20
Interviewer: “So now the second year—how were the crowds the second year? Still
the same numbers?”
Fort Wayne was great, the same numbers. People really—and we didn’t get harassed at
all, called “tomboys” or anything like that. Those people—well, the early forerunners in
the forties set the tone and we didn’t have any problems. Everybody else knew that it
was still a men’s game, but we never got any kind of harassment call or you know. 29:57
Interviewer: “Now the first year and the second year, you were going on the road
too, right?”
Yeah
Interviewer: “So, what were the road trips like?”
10
�Oh, they were excellent, we would get in the bus and everybody would try to get in the
back of the bus, but they were excellent and we would start singing our songs and
everything like that and South Bend wasn’t too far, but in Rockford, Illinois we would
leave after the game and all night and get there maybe like four o’clock in the morning,
go to the hotel and sign in at the hotel. Again, we wouldn’t play or be at the ballpark
until four o’clock, so normally we took in a movie. 30:42 That was normally it and after
the game we had two hours before our curfew and we would have to be in because the
manager was right there and the chaperone was right there and we knew when to come
in. 30:56
Interviewer: “You hadn’t traveled very much in terms of from your childhood and
now you’re traveling. Did you get an opportunity to spend any time in the towns
that you went to other than to see a movie or something?”
Well, sometimes, but not really, but spring training, that was my first spring training and
we got to go to Newton, North Carolina and I got my first train ride and I was excited.
Then when I went down south they had a whole different language, you know that drawl
and especially in Newton, North Carolina I remember people would---and I was playing
outfield and there was one kid in the stand near right field and he said, “hey Yankee go
home”, and I said, “Yankee, I’m a Reds fan”, and he said, “communist”, and I thought,
“what is this?” 31:48 I had no idea, but we made it and it was nice. People treated us
great, but again the food was different you know, hominy and grits, hominy and grits, oh
yuck. I was use to cereal, bacon, eggs and stuff like that. They didn’t have it; they had
hominy and grits everyday. I used to go across the street and get a hamburger. 32:21
Interviewer: “Where in the south did you go?”
Newton, North Carolina and played around, like another team like Kenosha or another
team that would train there. We would stay at a big boarding house, one team, and again
we were not allowed to fraternize with another team, so even though they stayed down a
block or whatever, we weren’t allowed to talk to them. After the game we never shook
hands or say, “nice game”, because they thought we would throw the game or something,
I don’t know what their thinking was. That was also in the men’s though and actually it
still is, but the media now is so great that they have to talk back and forth. I think that’s
what happened. 33:05
Interviewer: “So, after your second season, were you making fairly decent money
by that time?”
Oh yes, at that time I was making seventy dollars. I went up twenty dollars.
Interviewer: “What were you doing with the money?”
Well, I saved my money and I paid for my own—well, we didn’t have too much book
money then for school and I was still in high school, but I paid for my own clothes and
everything like that and the rest I just saved until I could buy a car.
Interviewer: “Were you sending money home?”
11
�No, not really, I kept my own. My mom let me keep it, she said, “you’re in charge”, so I
put it in the bank.
Interviewer: “That’s great. Now, 1953—I know, of course we all know now that
we’re getting to the end of the league although, you didn’t know it.”
It just never dawned on us, we just thought it was rumor, but 1953 was a good year. Bill
Ellington was my manager, and again we went down south and played ball and I was use
to that and the train and that was to me like having an airplane ride. I got on the all-stars
for third baseman and won the all-star game by pitching up to the thirteenth inning, I
think I pitched from the ninth inning to the thirteenth and we won the game four to three.
34:49
Interviewer: “How does one get chosen for the all-star game?”
They take everybody in the league and compare their averages and everything with
everybody else—hitting, fielding, so I played more third base then because what threw
me off on the other years was because I also pitched, so I had double duty, but I was
hitting well, I hardly had any errors and they brought me on the all-star team. 35:27
Interviewer: “What was your reaction when you found out?”
I was ecstatic, but I didn’t know I was going to end up pitching in the game you know.
Interviewer: “Mostly you’re a third baseman.”
I was chosen for third base and then he needed a pitcher because it was extra innings and
he put me in because he knew I was accurate, so I went in pitching and won the game.
My roommate hit the home run to win the game. 35:53
Interviewer: “Tell us about the game.”
Oh, it was exciting and there’s a picture in one of the books that somebody wrote. I was
just so happy, my roommate and I, we had big headlines in the paper.
Interviewer: “Walk us through the game. How did it open up? How was the
beginning, the first inning?”
Well, we always start it with the opposing team lining up on third base and we were on
first base V for victory, we always honored the veterans and the American flag, the whole
ball of wax just like the regular ball games and I was playing third base and you’re asking
me who we played, but it was the second team that was next to us, that’s who we had to
play. All the other all-stars, Fort Wayne, we were in first place, so I played with Fort
Wayne and we played against the all-stars, so our team playing against Fort Wayne as the
12
�all-stars. We beat the all-stars and like I said, we were very young. A lot of us were
young and I think the oldest one was twenty-five, so anyway, it was thrilling. 37:18
Interviewer: “How did the game open? How were the first few innings? Was it a
slam-dunk from the beginning?
Well it was—nobody could get a hit. I think Winsch pitched and she was good, so she
pitched and she was the number one pitcher and she was excellent. She had curve balls,
drop balls, you name it, and she was good.
Interviewer: “How did you do against her?”
I think I did all right; I had two for four, so I thought that was pretty good.
Interviewer: “How was the middle of the inning? Were you still going?”
Oh, we were battling; it was a terrific game for the fans because they just enjoyed it. It
probably was the longest game you know, we didn’t have all these gizmos like helmets to
put on and knee wraps or anything like that. It bothers me and I noticed somebody said
our games were two hours or two and a half hours and that game was like three hours and
that was really long and like I said, we speeded it up because we didn’t have all that
although, our pitching style is totally different from what they do now. 38:31 I had a full
wind up going like this then throwing the ball in.
Interviewer: “So when was the moment when it really determined the game was
going to go your way?”
Well, not until Jeanne hit the home run. I mean it was deadlocked and it looked like we
were going to be there all night until Jeanne Geissinger hit the home run and we were in
happyville.
Interviewer: “That’s wonderful, that’s wonderful—when that was over, and the
season was over and when you went home, was there a different reaction this time?”
39:10
Well, we got in the playoffs, but we never won the playoffs for some odd reason, I don’t
know what it was—just tired, so actually it started the beginning of 1954 when we went
to spring training we came through Ohio and some games in all of these little towns that
would bring the fans, so they would look for the players and another town that was pretty
good and semi-pro teams were there, so we played in my home town. My nephews came
out, they were just little like four or five years old and I played against my brother.
That’s when we played against the men and the men would pitch against the men and the
women would pitch against the women and then we beat them. 40:11 That was terrific
and like I said, there were like—there’s only like two thousand five hundred in our town
and I think there was a crowd of two thousand eight hundred and that was terrific because
I pitched and I won.
13
�Interviewer: “You said your cousins, were other members of your family there?”
No, my nephews and my brothers were there and my family and of course all my
classmates. I was pretty nervous and that’s the only time I remember being really
nervous because everybody was counting on me. 40:53
Interviewer: “What about the catholic… was it the priest?”
Yeah, he was there and he was praying for me.
Interviewer: “That must have been a pretty proud moment for you.”
Yes, very emotional and everybody talked about that game. They had flyers out, Katie
Horstman and Armstrong Airport which is just five miles down the road took a plane and
threw out flyers saying that we were coming into town. 41:23
Interviewer: “Do you remember after the game whether the father came up to you?
Did he?”
I think he came to the Wooden Shoe Inn, which is a big restaurant right in town and they
treated us to a chicken dinner. They were famous for chicken dinner and he came and
was very proud of me.
Interviewer: “He had to be considering the fact that he started the game when you
were there.”
He’s still living and I still go back there and see him. He does mass every once and a
while and he’s retired, but excellent.
Interviewer: “Wow, wow, we should send him a copy of this.”
Oh yeah, he would love it. His name is Father Shuey, ordained and handsome, everyone
went out for CYO. I never even knew half the kids could play you know. I think about
fifty kids came out and we couldn’t take care of fifty and we ended up with twenty.
42:18
Interviewer: “So, are there any other highlights from 1953 that you can think of?”
Just that I was becoming more involved and playing more games, like everyday unless I
pitched and I would get time off and my batting average kept going up, I think it was like
two eighty nine, but again the ball was a little bit bigger than the regular ball. Now,
coming into 1954 they couldn’t find those balls anymore and they weren’t going to make
them because they didn’t know if the league was going to fold in the middle or when, so
they didn’t want all these balls, so then we played with a regular baseball. Oh my god
how easy, I mean girl’s hands are smaller then men and I could grip that ball, wow, and
14
�hit it. 43:14 We were hitting home runs galore, so it was the best thing that ever
happened. Bill Allington became our coach and he was strict. When we went on the
road, he would have thirty questions and you better read that rulebook and you better
answer them right or you had laps to run. He was strict, which was very good and I
believed in discipline. I had discipline from my mom and dad and of course with eight
kids you have discipline. I had nuns in school although, it was a public school, Precious
Blood where the father came in, and they were strict, with rulers, the ruler sisters, and
when I came into baseball and saw all those rules—I was born with discipline, so I didn’t
mind it. Although, you always try to see if you can beat the system, right? 44:21
Interviewer: “So, coming into 1954 was the atmosphere at all different in terms of
either the moral of the teams?”
No, except that we were all praying that it wouldn’t end because then they kept—like in
the middle of the season they said they didn’t think it was going to continue because they
couldn’t afford it and you know, different ownerships of different teams. Fort Wayne
was great, For Wayne was solid, but the other teams—television came in and people
would go to see the guy’s play and we also, couldn’t find girls. We had like Jr. Daisies,
Blue Sox, and Jr. Blue Sox similar to a minor league team and they were anxious to come
up, but we didn’t have enough of them. They only had like two teams and they would
play against each other in each town. 45:21
Interviewer: “How about the fans, was there any difference? I don’t mean about
being enthused or anything like that, but number?”
Well, that went down because they were watching television. They had more things to
do and in wartime it was very restricted like gas rationing and all of that stuff, so that was
no more and they could go place and you know, more things to see.
Interviewer: “I’m going to ask you a question that at the time you might not have
been able to answer, but I’ll just pose it anyway. Was there anytime up until 1954
that you actually thought this would be a career you would be doing? You were a
really young girl.” 46:07
Oh I know, I was just getting in my prime. No, I thought it would last forever. To me I
prayed everyday that it would last forever, but after 1954, most people don’t know, but
then Bill Allington got a group of us, eleven of us, twelve with him, two cars and we
went all over the United States, except for the east, and we played against the men. We
had a bookie out of Omaha, Matt Pascal was his name, and he would get the schedule
maybe two weeks ahead of time so we would know. We would play a game, go to the
next town, play another game and we had a hundred and ten games, the same as we did
for the Daisies. We played every day, but we had to travel. You only had a duffle bag,
that’s all you could have, your uniform and whatever. We were always in the laundry
room, but like I said, we weren’t like the Silver Bullets, like Phil Niekro did, they played
against the men. 47:13 At that time that never would have worked because nobody
would come to the game and we didn’t want to say that, “hey, we’re stronger and better
than you”, the men, although a lot of times we were except when we played the triple A
15
�teams, the semi-pro teams, they were good, but we had their pitcher and catcher and they
would pitch against them and we would pitch against the girls, so we won most of our
ball games. Every four o’clock we would advertise, beside the posters that we had, that
map. We would go in the fire truck and run around town in the fire truck telling people
that the game was at seven o’clock they would announce it. It was thrilling and I saw the
whole United States except for the east. 47:55 That was wonderful to me because I
loved traveling.
Interviewer: “This is after 1954 though?”
This is after 1954—55,56,57 we did that for three years.
Interviewer: “Let’s go back to 1954 though, when did you find out and how did you
find out that it was over?”
Well, I think it was after the play offs and then they said, “count on not being here next
year. I think that we may not have teams”, and we all knew that was the end 48:34.
Interviewer: “What was the reaction?”
The reaction was very, very sad, we counted on it, especially the very young ones, and
we were just getting into our prime. I thought, “my god, what are we going to do? We
got to work”. That was our biggest reaction, what are we going to do? Here I just got out
of high school and I thought, “wow, not I got to look for a job”, so that was most of us,
we were very, very upset. 49:09
Interviewer: “How was your last year though playing?”
My last year, my god, I batted three twenty eight, I think, and pitched and won I don’t
know how many games, but it was excellent because I loved that little baseball you
know. The size changed to a regular baseball and it was tremendous you know. You just
could hit it harder, throw it harder, everything, I just enjoyed it. When I was a kid
playing with my brothers that’s the ball we used and I was use to it, so it came back and I
was very happy about it. 49:49
Interviewer: “Any highlights that you can think of from 1954? What really sticks
out to you that may have been the big ones?”
Well, just my hitting, I hit a lot of home runs and I was a long ball hitter because I didn’t
like sliding in the short skirts. I did that once at second base and oh my god that hurt. I
always made sure I get a single, a double, a triple or a home run. I wanted to make sure I
would get to that base without sliding.
Interviewer: “You say you went through three years of playing with this kind of
team that was kind of put together after the end.”
Yeah, Bill Allington and we had spring training—like we went to Arlington, Texas, that’s
where we had our first spring training and we played amongst ourselves first to warm up
16
�and then we played all the teams coming through Texas, Oklahoma and New Mexico
you know, he had them all booked for us. 50:55
Interviewer: “This is still professional ball though and you’re still getting paid?”
Oh yeah, we changed our name to All American that was it, All American Girls
Professional Baseball rather than saying Fort Wayne Daisies or something like that, but
we had the same uniforms.
Interviewer: “What did you end up doing after you—did you continue to play
baseball after three years or what?”
Well, I was in Fort Wayne, Indiana and I didn’t want to go back to school because it was
so much fun it sort of spoiled me from going to get my education or further my education
you know, so three of us rookies went to the cookie factory in Fort Wayne, Archway I
think it was called, and anyway two days was like an eternity and I couldn’t take it
anymore watching the cookies and besides I would have gotten thrown out because we
started throwing cookies you know, we were bad and we didn’t like that kind of work. I
went right to IUPU extension and signed up—I’m going back to school, so I started
college at IU Purdue. 52:03 Ernie, I can’t think of his last name now, Ernie Burns or
Ernie anyway, he was the general manager for the Daisies and he was also the general
manager for the Fort Wayne Comets hockey team, and so I needed a part time job while I
was going to school ,so he signed me up that I could work in the office with the tickets
and I got to meet all the players and stuff and went to the coliseum. It was great and I
had a good part time job and went to school, to college. I did that for two years and
then—gosh I don’t know what I did afterwards, after school, anyway, I was twenty-five
years of age. 53:00 When I was twenty-five years of age I went to medical records--oh,
I worked at Burnham City Hospital and stayed with Dotty Schroeder’s parents and I went
part time to Illinois State University then and came back and worked at Burnham City
Hospital for a year in admissions because I was always interested in medicine and
everything and I was sort of in pre-med. Then the medical record librarian came to me
and she said, “you can make a lot more money being in medical records”, so I talked with
her and sort of worked with her on weekends and everything. 53:38 I went to St.
Elizabeth’s Hospital in Danville, Illinois and spent a whole year with the Franciscan
Sisters of Sacred Heart from Mokena, Illinois and she was our instructor and only ten
people could enter the school and you had to have two years of college and then a year of
practice at the hospital to become a Registered Medical Records Librarian. 54:09 They
were making good money, like a hundred dollars a week, and at that time it was super
money, so I was all for that, but then I got to know the sisters and I thought they were
super, and then I got a calling to go to the convent, so two days after I graduated from
there I entered the Franciscan Sisters of the Sacred Heart in Mokena, Illinois. I went to
the convent, was a nun five years, it was really a nursing order except for some
elementary schools, so the reverend mother decided to have a Sacred Heart Academy, a
high school and she didn’t want any lay people and she understood that I played baseball
and she asked me if I wanted to be a phys-ed teacher, well she didn’t ask me you just did
it—some more discipline for me. 55:04 So I went to DePaul, Loyola and Illinois—I
17
�don’t know, it was another university there because I needed drivers ed and DePaul
didn’t have driver ed, so I went to that other college and got my driver ed and went to
DePaul and graduated from there in 1965. I taught at the academy because I had two
years of college I could do that in that private school and I taught in a private academy
and the girls were super. 55:44
Interviewer: “Did the girls know? Did you let them know?”
Well, later on they found out—DePaul grads you know, my picture was in the Sun Times
with my habit playing soccer, so I made headlines. I also got in a lot of trouble with
those state students because I would—one day I drove the reverend mother into town and
I could drive because I was I was older. Most nuns who were becoming nuns were under
twenty-five, like eighteen, nineteen, twenty and she knew I could drive since I was
teaching drivers ed anyhow. I had to drop her off downtown and I went up town to
Fullerton Avenue to DePaul University and the state student saw that I had a car, a big
Cadillac, you know people give stuff to the religious, so eleven o’clock came around and
they said, “hey Sister John Anthony, (that was my name) hey, let’s go to the baseball
game today the Cubs are playing”, and I said, “Cubs, yeah, but who are they playing?”
And they said, “The Reds, the Cincinnati Reds”. Because I was always talking about
Reds, Johnny Bench, Pete Rose and I said, “I can’t go, I don’t have any money and I
don’t think I’m allowed to go and I don’t think the reverend mother would like it”. 57:09
“We’ll never tell, you don’t need money and we’ll pay your way in”, and I thought, “ oh
gosh, should I or shouldn’t I? Well, what can it hurt, kids want to go”, so guys and gals,
we all piled in the car, I think I had ten of them and the Cubs ball park wasn’t too far
from Fullerton Avenue, so I wouldn’t use much gas, so we come up there, the parking is
horrendous, so I went right up there and he said, “hey lady what are you trying to do?”
And I said, “I want to know where I can park?” he saw my habit and he said, “oh, sister
the vice president isn’t here today, so you can park right here. Wow, the co-eds, “way to
go Sister John Anthony”, and I was a hero. 57:57 He said, “do you have tickets?” I
said, “tickets, I don’t even have any money”, and he said, “well he wasn’t going to be
there, so we could have his box seats”, so here I was, I was a hero. I mean I felt so good.
The Cubs were beating the Reds you know, so the ninth inning, the Reds and I was going
“way to go Cincinnati”, and I’d get all excited. I didn’t think anything about it—came
down, went and took them back to school ok, picked up reverend mother. The
Archbishop came into town, new Archbishop, so she had to meet him or something, so
we went back to Mokena and during vespers, it was just after six o’clock we would pray
the vespers, and all at once I get this tap on the shoulder and it’s the reverend mother.
We went out in the hall and she said, “Where were you this afternoon?” I said, “why?
You know I was at DePaul University I had things to do, study, went to my classes and
everything. 59:04 She said, “then how come I saw you on television cheering for the
Reds?” I never thought about it and I said, “mother, we’re not allowed to watch
television”, and she said, “the Archbishop was in town and I met with him and she was
on television. They interrupted the program saying that one of your nuns was cheering
the ball game”. Well, she didn’t like that too well and that was only one incident, so
anyway in 1965 left the convent before my final vows. Then I worked at the medical
records library in Dyer, Indiana and then taught in Gary, Indiana the next following and
18
�spent my summers and a year at Miami University in Ohio because I got my masters
degree and if you taught there your education was free at the college. :08 I took a big
deduction coming from Indiana to Ohio, but it all worked out the same. I got my masters
then I worked five years teaching phys-ed and science at Kendallville Jr. High in
Kendallville, Indiana. Then I came back to my home town, that’s when title nine was
trying to come out, 1972 to 1975, so I became the phys-ed teacher there and actually jr.
high school and high school that’s all I would have, but I said, “why do you want to start
a program in jr. high? Why don’t you start it?” Illinois has a super phys-ed program,
they still do, they have phys-ed every day from the first grade to the twelfth, but these
other states don’t have that, once a week or whatever, and Minster, my home town, didn’t
even have a phys-ed program for the elementary. They only had jr. high and freshman
and sophomore and I said, “What do you want to do that for? Start with the little kids”,
so I did, I had the whole nine classes per day; I really loaded myself up, but stayed there a
long time. 1:23 So then the teams started coming out where we could play state
tournaments and that’s what I wanted, I wanted to be a coach, I had a great desire. So we
had track the very first thing in Ohio and that was in 1975, so we had a track team and
came in runner up in the state. The kids didn’t know anything about running. They had
no idea what a discus or a shot put looked like because we didn’t have boys track either,
until we started the girls track program. Then we were very successful, 1976 through
1980 we were the state champs in our division, three divisions in track, and then 1982,
1985 and 1989, so we got eight state track titles and they talked me into cross country.
The first year, 1982, the girls, state champions, so I was very successful in that. 2:23
The town loved me and I loved them, that’s why I go back there all the time.
Interviewer: “You stayed in sports, of course you stayed in education, stayed in
sports, when did you start to realize that other people were recognizing what you
had done when you were just a teenager in your early days with the All American
Girls. Was there a time when you started to realize that people were knowing about
that?”
You mean as far as playing baseball?
Interviewer: Yes
Well, it was sort of dead because we all went our own way, we communicated, and I
communicated with the Weaver sisters and Dotty Schroeder and some of the others. We
always wrote Christmas cards, that was one thing we always did. To our teammates, but
eventually that falls apart too, so until they started the reunion and I think that was in
1982, it was forty years after we quit, well, yeah forty years I think. 3:40 We met in
Chicago for reunion, everybody was sort of hesitant, like in the movie, should I go or
shouldn’t I, I probably won’t recognize anybody, but everybody remembered the voices
or the walk or whatever and it was hilarious you know. “Is that really you?” Because
everybody changed so much and got so much older. The people that were twenty were in
their sixties—grey hair, white hair and thank God we had name tags. Once we got use to
it all these memories flowed back, but that was one heck of a nice thing to do. 4:27
19
�Interviewer: “You look back on that period of time as just part of the evolution, I
imagine, of your becoming the person that you are now. That was just one part of it
right? When did you realize that other people were looking at that period as
something very unusual and very special? Am I making myself clear?”
Oh yeah, first of all there wasn’t professional baseball for women—ended, it’s the only
time in history that was an organization where you got paid and professional. Jo Weaver
was a super runner, but she couldn’t enter the Olympics because the Olympics at that
time was amateur, so she couldn’t go to Olympics and she could have made it easily. We
had to understand that from that period until about 1970, girls athletics were taboo except
for CYO, anything voluntary, GAA, Girls Athletic Association, that’s all that kids had.
5:35 When I came back to Minster I thought, “wow, these kids don’t have anything, at
least I got something playing baseball and I got an education and I was taught in Illinois
where the phys-ed system is super”. I never played soccer or field hockey or anything
like that, so I came back there and I wanted to give something back to my town where
they appreciated me and so I started the whole program. 6:04
Interviewer: “Looking back on that period, and you have a lot of things to smile
about, do you think that particular period had an affect on you and the person you
are today? You were a teen and a young girl at that time. Was there anything that
happened then that you can look back on and say, “That helped me get here?”
What I did then, I wanted my girls in Minster to feel the same way that I did, that they
had an opportunity, they got a chance, “ok girls let’s go out”. It wasn’t easy , now you’re
talking about Germans, and the boys were still on one side of the room and girls were on
the other side. Phys-ed was still segregated; girls only, boys only and boys had a hard
time with it. 7:03 We didn’t as much and I was very fortunate to have some super
athletes that didn’t even know it because they never had a chance. I know how they felt
because I thought I was going to be stuck on the farm. I thought, “whoa, we gotta do
something”, and if we do something great people and if you have discipline—I put rules
out, no drinking, no this or you’re suspended, I didn’t even give them one chance. I said,
“this is it, if you want this we’re going to have to do it right and get on top immediately”,
so that’s what we did. 7:37 Like I said, “My athletes do it now because they’re
continuing my tradition over there because we twenty-three titles in that town and one
title for boys”. We showed them.
Interviewer: “Thank you so much, it was wonderful and you were wonderful.”
I don’t know, but I did get in five halls of fames with Annie Oakley, who was one of my
idols, The Ohio Women’s Hall of Fame with Doris Day and I was real happy about that
and of course and the National Track Coach Hall of Fame and the Ohio Track Hall of
Fame and in the Western Buckeye League.
20
�21
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
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All-American Girls Professional Baseball League Interviews
Creator
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Grand Valley State University. History Department
Description
An account of the resource
The All-American Girls Professional Baseball League was started by Philip Wrigley, owner of the Chicago Cubs, during World War II to fill the void left by the departure of most of the best male baseball players for military service. Players were recruited from across the country, and the league was successful enough to be able to continue on after the war. The league had teams based in Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana and Michigan, and operated between 1943 and 1954. The 1954 season ended with only the Fort Wayne, South Bend, Grand Rapids, Kalamazoo, and Rockford teams remaining. The League gave over 600 women athletes the opportunity to play professional baseball. Many of the players went on to successful careers, and the league itself provided an important precedent for later efforts to promote women's sports.
Source
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<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/484">All-American Girls Professional Baseball League Collection, (RHC-58)</a>
Rights
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<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Subject
The topic of the resource
Sports for women
World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American
All-American Girls Professional Baseball League--Personal narratives
Oral history
Baseball players--Minnesota
Baseball players--Indiana
Baseball players--Wisconsin
Baseball players--Michigan
Baseball players--Illinois
Baseball for women--United States
Publisher
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Grand Valley State University Libraries, Special Collections and University Archives, 1 Campus Drive, Allendale, MI, 49401
Identifier
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RHC-58
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video/mp4
application/pdf
Type
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Moving Image
Text
Language
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eng
Date
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2017-10-02
Contributor
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Smither, James
Boring, Frank
Relation
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Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Oral History
A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
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RHC-58_KHorstman
Title
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Horstman, Katie (Interview transcript and video), 2009
Creator
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Horstman Katie
Description
An account of the resource
Katie Horstman was born on April 14, 1935 in Minster, Ohio. Before joining the All American Girls Professional Baseball League she played baseball with her brother John. She started playing softball with the Catholic Youth Organization (CYI). At 15, Horstman started her professional career when Max Carey signed her to play for the Fort Wayne Daisies. In her first season of 1951 she played for the Kenosha Comets and the Fort Wayne Daisies as a pitcher and outfielder. Under Coach Jimmy Foxx in 1952, During her second season, in 1952 she played under Jimmy Foxx who switched her to play as a utility infielder. In 1953, she played for the Fort Wayne Daisies and the All Star Team as a third baseman and pitched part of an all-star game. Her biggest highlight was finishing her final season with a batting average of three twenty eight just as the All American Girls Professional League was ending. Afterwards, Horstman went on to become a Physical Education teacher.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Boring, Frank (Interviewer)
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives
Subject
The topic of the resource
Oral history
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Video recordings
All-American Girls Professional Baseball League--Personal narratives
Baseball for women--United States
Baseball
Sports for women
World War, 1939-1945
Baseball players--Wisconsin
Baseball players--Indiana
Women
Language
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eng
Rights
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<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Type
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Moving Image
Text
Relation
A related resource
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2009-09-26
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/484">All-American Girls Professional Baseball League Collection, (RHC-55)</a>
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
application/pdf
video/mp4
-
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/b7a66745ea215e0bc2736060a6b0bdd4.m4v
383bb850d6fc9dd58b65ac321c047f4c
https://digitalcollections.library.gvsu.edu/files/original/04972d69a48528b42796da7289189efe.pdf
371474edf275f985a93aaeefc2b19f2e
PDF Text
Text
Grand Valley State University
All American Girls Professional Baseball League
Veterans’ History Project
Interviewee’s Name: Marilyn Jenkins
Interviewed by: Frank Boring
Transcribed by: Joan Raymer August 15, 2008
Interviewer: “ Marilyn, if we could begin with your name and where and when were
you born?” (02:46:25)
I’m Marilyn Jenkins and I was born in Grand Rapids, Michigan on September 18, 1934.
(02:46:29)
Interviewer: ”What was your early childhood like?” (02:46:38)
Well, I had one sister who married when I was four years old and so I was like an only
child within a sense. Probably that was good because times were touch then coming out
of the Depression and anyway, I grew up on the near south side of Grand Rapids near the
corner of Cass and Hall Street, which was about a long block and a railroad track from
South Field where the “Chicks” played. I had a good childhood. During the war dad
would pile the neighborhood kids in the car and take them to the lake swimming etc. I
have a lot of fond memories of my childhood. Growing up in the neighborhood, it was a
neighborhood then and you knew everybody. There was a lot of porch activity at night
and it was a good time. (00:02:46:48)
Interviewer: “What did your father do for a living?” (02:47:42)
MY father sold meat for Swift and Company and then again coming out of the
depression, at night he would cut the meat for Jim Nader at Nader’ss grocery store on
Hall Street, which was right around the corner. I kind of fed into that too because I
would go and visit him there and he would bring me candy bars. (02:47:43)
Interviewer: “How about your mother?” (02:48:05)
She was pretty much a housewife except I remember for a short period of time during
WWII she was a “Rosie the Riveter” at a local place here in Grand Rapids. I don’t
remember what it was called at that time, but I remember her in the bib overalls and the
hat. (00:02:48:06)
Interviewer: “Just like the picture.” (02:48:23)
Just like the picture, right. She didn’t like it, but she did it for a while. (02:48:24)
Interviewer: “When was your first exposure to baseball, or sports of any kind?”
(02:48:35)
1
�Well, dad was a real sports fan and frequently on Sunday afternoons he would take me to
Valley Field to watch the black leagues play over there and I met some of those fellows
that played there. In fact I met one just the other day. Anyway, I liked baseball—he
taught me to like baseball—he played catch with me and all that. He wanted a boy, but
he got a girl and consequently he was doing something in his short life that he lived after
I was born. (02:48:38)
Interviewer: “This period of time in America was very difficult economically. How
did your family fare?” (02:49:11)
Well, dad worked two jobs and mother went to work there for a period of time. We were
coming out of the Depression and I don’t know that I was anticipated product there. I
don’t know that they wanted another child, but dad would—I think we fared—we always
had enough to eat. Dad would exchange coupons for meat, gas and all that. For gas he
would exchange with neighbors. They would switch back and forth because he had all
the meat, because he was in meat. We got along all right, we weren’t wealthy by any
means, but we made it. (02:49:15)
Interviewer: “You mentioned the black leagues, but were there other baseball
related activities going on around you?” 02:50:00)
I don’t recall any. (02:50:04)
Interviewer: “So the exposure was through your father and seeing these other
players?”(02:50:07)
I was always interested. I remember I use to—all sports—scour the Sunday papers for
pictures. I’m a U of M fan and I would study those and baseball—different seasons and
different sports and I really got into it big time. 02:50:11)
Interviewer: “Did you have a radio?” (02:50:30)
Yes, we had a radio. (02:50:31)
Interviewer: “So, did you hear broadcasts?” (02:50:33)
Broadcasts of sports. I would sit and cross my legs in front of the radio and watch—
listen to them. (02:50:35)
Interviewer: “You said watch, this is before TV.” (02:50:40)
This was watch—we had one of the upright radios. (02:50:45)
2
�Interviewer: “I understand from an earlier conversation that tragedy struck your
family when you were still quite young and in your teens. What actually
happened?” (02:50:50)
Dad—when I was thirteen, I think the summer when I was thirteen, he was diagnosed
with Leukemia and that fall he passed away and of course that changed the whole
dynamics of the family. Now there was just mother and I because my sister had married
a Navy man and they were stationed in Long Beach. Anyway, there was mother and I
and it changed significantly. I remembered we struggled. I think she got a small pension
because he had been in WWI, dad had, and he had been injured in WWI, nothing that
affected his walking or his thinking or anything, but I think it was frozen feet and a few
other things. Anyway, it changed our lives and what it did to me was—I was thirteen and
I was going to South High School. I had to cut right through the alley to get to the high
school and I got a job. I don’t know if I was thirteen or fourteen, but I got a job up on
Division at a sundry store, a Quick Mart today, and I worked there, not during the
summer because that was the “Chicks”, but I worked there after school and I think I was
making 50 or 40 cents an hour maybe, but it helped. Mother was—one thing I remember
is that we had a car, we had a 1939 Chevrolet and if my memory is correct, in 1947 when
my dad died, cars were in great demand. It was in the garage, mother didn’t drive, which
was not unusual for women at that time and I wasn’t driving yet, and she had them lined
up at her door to buy that car. I remember she got a thousand dollars out of it and it was
eight years old. Anyway, that helped. A thousand dollars went a long way then.
Anyway, I got a job and I worked right through graduation from high school. (02:01:00)
Interviewer: “What did you—I realize you were very young at that time and young
people don’t always know what they want to do with their lives, but what were you
thinking about? What were you going to do?” (02:53:17)
What was I going to do? Right. Well, one thing I had to do was I had to play baseball.
Anything more secure or substantial than that wasn’t on my money. I knew there was no
money to go to college, there weren’t scholarships and all that business and in what? I
wasn’t qualified. I was a good student in high school, but anyway, I had to play ball.
When the ball league ended in 1954 I went to x-ray school. I became a radiology
technologist at Butterworth Hospital and I worked at that until 1972 I think, but in that
interim period of time, I also went to Community College, I went nights. (02:53:28)
Interviewer: “Lets get back to that a little later. You’re in high school and at what
point did you discover that there was a baseball league? That there was a women’s
league?” (02:54:39)
I have to go way back. In 1945, dad was still alive, and he saw in the Sunday paper that
there was going to be a women’s baseball league coming to Grand Rapids and it was
going to be at South Field, which was just a short distance from my house. Summers
were kind of—I remember playing softball at Jefferson School grounds, but he told me
that I should go over to the field and see if I could get a job, doing what I didn’t know at
eleven years old. (02:54:41)
3
�Interviewer: “Let me go back. You said you were playing softball?”
Yes, I played on the school grounds there.
Interviewer: “But there was no team?”
No, just the neighborhood boys, and we set up teams and played there a lot. (02:55:56)
Interviewer: “Were you the only girl?”
I was the only girl.
Interviewer: “So, you already felt that you liked the game?
Yes, I liked the game.
Interviewer: “What position were you playing when you played with the boys?”
Any position. It was just a lot of neighborhood kids and we had a good time.
Interviewer: “So there was no official high school girls baseball team?”
No, in high school at South, our gym activities included square dancing, kickball,
badminton, volleyball, but nothing organized. There may have been archery that was
organized, but nothing that interested me. 2:56
Interviewer: “So now your father sees that there is a team in Grand Rapids and he
suggests to you to go and check this out. Tell us about the day you went there.”
Well, I don’t remember the specific day I went there, but I was pretty timid and I met the
groundskeeper there, I didn’t know anybody, it wasn’t a case of who you know, I didn’t
know anyone, but I just went over there and I met the grounds keeper and his name was
“Chick Batts”. Has anybody else mentioned that name to you? He was probably a fifty
year old man at that time and he had a little helper by the name of Pete something, I don’t
remember, but the interesting thing about “Chick” was that he only had one arm and I
was amazed as I watched him throw a ball by switching the mitt between his underarm of
the stub to his good arm. Anyway, I asked him if there was any work I could do and he
said, “sure”. 2:57 Well, the first job I did was—this is right at the beginning of the
league now, they had cut the grass out because South Field was a football field at that
time. They cut the grass out and the diamond, the dirt was full of stones so I picked
stones out of the diamond. I don’t know how long I did that. Another job I had was
cleaning under the bleachers, which was kind of a fun job because you would find nickels
and dimes out of people’s pockets. Anyway, in that period of time, it was just a short
period of time, and somebody, I don’t recall who it was, asked me if I would be batgirl
so, would I be batgirl, of course I would be batgirl. I was privileged to be in that
4
�position. I became batgirl and I was batgirl from the time I was eleven, which was 1945,
until 19—through 1951. 2:58
Interviewer: “Back up just a minute. During the period of time that you were
picking up the stones and all that, did you actually meet the players?”
Absolutely.
Interviewer: “Let’s talk about that.”
Talk about being in awe, I got into the game—I don’t know who was batgirl in the
beginning, but I became batgirl pretty quick. Anyway, I got into the games free, that was
Dad’s purpose in sending me over there so, if I worked I could get into the games free.
These women, I was just in awe and thunderstruck by them. A bunch of wonderful
women, and I remember they were nice to me too, every one of them was. When I saw
that Connie Wisnewski back in 1945, it’s too bad that Connie is still not alive because
she would be a wonderful interview. She was the pitcher at the beginning there, and
Gabby Ziegler and I don’t know, I could go on with lots of names, but I was just
awestruck by them. 2:59
Interviewer: “So, I don’t expect you to remember exactly this moment, but when
the first games were being played, what was your reaction to seeing these women
playing baseball?”
Just astounded. Dad would come over to a few games too. He had to make sure that I
was in an all right sitting there because he was that kind of a dad. Anyway, it was just
amazing, and then to see the people in the stands was another amazing think. Have you
been by South Field here?
Interviewer: “Yes.”
Of course you can’t tell where it was right now. It had a short right field porch, but
anyway—when I think back to the period of time when I was batgirl, the box seats that
were right around where I was sitting, the prominent people in Grand Rapids were there
and they were supporting this at that time. 3:00 The stands would be full and at one time
they built more stand out in the left field because it used to be that you could hit the ball
forever out there. The women playing ball—it was phenomenal. I think it progressed
though, it progressed from a game of softball to a game of baseball, we know that.
Interviewer: “Yes, because they were pitching underhand and side hand and
eventually overhand.”
In 1947 it went sidearm and then overhand, that’s when Beansie came in, she never
would have made it if it hadn’t and she says that. 3:01
Interviewer: “She did say that, yes. Did you have any inkling at this point you’re
the batgirl there, that you could eventually play baseball?”
5
�Absolutely, and I had a lot of opportunity too, that’s one thing that was given to me.
Batting practice sometimes, as I got a little older, I’d throw batting practice and
sometimes I would even catch at batting practice, that’s how I ended up being catcher, or
I would roam in the outfield. Oh yeah, I had to—if I hadn’t, not that I was that good, but
if I hadn’t had the opportunity in 1952, that’s when I graduated from high school, to play,
that probably would have been the biggest disappointment of my life. 3:02
Interviewer: “This might be a stupid question, but what does a batgirl do?”
Well, a batgirl goes out and gets the bat after the hitter hits, you see them in the major
leagues today too, they have batboy on their back, and you got out and get the bat or they
bring the umpire balls, or they also, to get into this a little bit more, you shine the shoes,
you carry the bats and balls down to the field from the club house, and you run errands,
and you’re in very close contact with the ball players and man did I admire them.
Interviewer: “From that period, and I realize that we’re going back quite a distance
and you were a very young girl at that time, what were some of the things that you
saw that really amazed you? I understand that you’re in awe and you’re watching
these women, but somebody hit a homerun or something happened.” 3:03
Well, it would hard for me to be specific, but when I saw the home runs, I saw the no
hitters, which in softball was not uncommon, and the competition, that was—I think I
really developed the competitive spirit then, although I think it’s calmed down as I’ve
gotten older. It was phenomenal. I can tell you, but maybe I should wait until later, one
of my biggest thrills playing. So you want to hear it now?”
Interviewer: “Sure, while you’re in the mood.”
At one point, I don’t remember if it was the last year or the year before—1953 or 1954,
we converted to a regulation baseball. Now I loved that because my hands were small
and I could throw it better and everything. I think my first time at bat, if I remember
correctly, with a regulation baseball; I hit one out of the park. Oh man, what a thrill and I
don’t remember if it was South Bend or Kalamazoo, it was one of those two cities. That
was a thrill.
Interviewer: “Going back again to being a batgirl. You were an only child
basically, your father died while you were very young, you’re struggling with your
mom to survive, but you go to this baseball team and you were batgirl. These were
amazing women, did you get a sense of family or a feeling of family?” 3:04
Maybe a little bit, I never thought of it that way, but I was batgirl when dad died and I
remember Dotty Hunter, our chaperone, was living in town then, and I remember she
came to see me then and man, that meant a lot. They sent me cards etc., and yeah, they
were sort of my family. I never thought of it that way. That was my purpose in life at
that time other than looking after my mother at home. 3:05
6
�Interviewer: “When did it—did you develop an idea that you wanted to play on the
team or did something just happen, how did that transition from batgirl to trying
out?”
Well, as I said, I had been terribly disappointed, but I was encouraged by many of them
along the way too. I had a pretty good arm, not for pitching because I didn’t have good
control, but it was something that I had to do. It was a huge part of my life after dad died
and maybe even before. You brought up family and that could be it.
Interviewer: “Did you consciously, as you’re watching, you have a job to do of
course, you’ve the bats and all this and we can’t downplay this because it’s an
important part of the game and you have to do these things, but were there
moments when you thought—I’m going to do that?”
I don’t know if I ever thought that, but I knew that I wanted to play. I had some thrills,
Beansie probably told you about her favorite story about her game in Kalamazoo—well I
was catching that game and I wanted to do it, in fact, if I had a choice when I graduated
from high school of playing for the “Chicks” or going to college, I’d have taken the
“Chicks”. Later on I probably would have taken going to college, but I did that anyway.
3:06
Interviewer: “So, what was the actual transition? When did this transition from
batgirl to—did you have to tryout?”
Yes, I had to go through that and there were others trying out too. It was in the spring of
1952 was when I was graduating from high school and there were other people there
trying out. 3:07
Interviewer: “What were the tryouts like?”
Well, they put you through the drills.
Interviewer: “So you were at the same field you were at before?”
South
field—at this point the league had changed significantly and it was at South Field. There
were local girls trying out. too.
Interviewer: “About how many do you think?”
About ten.
Interviewer: “So, now you got the baseball field, the manager, was he the one that
was setting everything up?
7
�Yes.
Interviewer: “So what did you have to do to tryout?”
They would hit fly balls, you would bat, you would take infield practice, they would talk
to you and I think one of the things, as the league was losing its popularity there, which it
did significantly we know that, they wanted a local girl, which makes sense to me. They
figured I would bring in some people, but I don’t know if I did or not. Getting back
there a little bit, I remember when it was in June of 1952 we were playing—I remember
my first game well, but anyway, it was a matter of if I was going to play or graduate from
high school. Well, I did the smart thing and I graduated. I went through the ceremony.
It was a quandary. My first game I played was at Bigelow Field, I’m sure it was,
anyway, I remember well the first batter up was Dotty Key of the Rockford Peaches. I
was playing center field then and she hit a line drive right smack at me. 3:08
I think the thing was going up and man, am I glad I caught it. If I hadn’t, it would have
gone to the fence and been history. That’s just a side there. I had to play, that was the
key. I had to have the opportunity and I’m still thankful for it. 3:09
Interviewer: “Your first game and you caught the line drive, wow.”
It came smack at me and if it had gone over my head, it would have gone forever at
Bigelow Field. 3:10
Interviewer: “How do you feel about your first game?”
Nervous, very nervous. Here I was—the gals were all nice to me, they had known me a
long time, but here I was having the first opportunity to do what I wanted to do, full
uniform, full everything and butterflies.
Interviewer: “But, when you caught that ball?”
That helped. That helped a lot. That was the big difference there.
Interviewer: “ I played little league and so I do understand the camaraderie. I have
never played professionally, but I know that when I pitched and I got right into that
zone and the guy swung, it was a feeling of excitement and when you caught that
ball?”
It was a feeling. You hit that—like this rookie catcher for the Tigers the other night, his
first hit is that triple that wins the game. He’ll never forget that, he’ll never forget that.
If he never gets another hit, he’ll never forget. 3:11
Interviewer: “Tell me about the uniform.”
Well, I think the uniform was in the 1940’s a significant part of the drawing of the
crowds, the fans that came to the game. As I remember the 40’s, women didn’t wear
8
�shorts, not in public, I don’t know if they wore them, but they didn’t wear shorts in
public. You come out with this—a lot of these gals were really attractive, too-- and you
come out in this short uniform with these good looking legs and that uniform was it.
There whole purpose of developing this league, or beginning this league, that uniform
was a significant part of it, as I see it. 3:12
Interviewer: “I grew up in the 60’s when the mini skirt became very popular and
this is pretty close to being a mini skirt and this is the 40’s and 50’s.”
Right, I mean the legs are bare from up here to the top of your socks and you know it’s
silly to talk about that today, isn’t it? It’s history I know, not that I wear shorts that much
anymore, but what you see the girls in today.
Interviewer: “Then it was significant, because it was something you didn’t see
normally. Rosemary talked about how she was embarrassed to come out.”
I sensed that because I had the experience before, you’re embarrassed.
Interviewer: “What about as a practical, this is the part that always amazed me,
because I’ve seen pictures and film footage of girls, I should say women, sliding into
a base. Now, the men had these long protected pants. What was that like?” 3:13
You know, I think it was something that—it wasn’t pleasant and I had some pretty good
“strawberries”, as we called them, but it was expected of us. That was—I think and I can
say this with a reasonable amount of certainty too, that if you would have put these
women in 1945, in a pant, forget it, it wouldn’t have worked. That’s the way I see it. I
would have been easier on their legs—I think that was—I’ve heard Dotty Hunter talk
about this. That was the magic. Phil Wrigley was really sharp and his advisors there, the
way they put things together. The movie depicted that well too. 3:14
Interviewer: “We’ll talk about that a little later. So, you got through your first
game. What was the reaction of your fellow teammates to the fact that you caught
that ball?”
I don’t know that they reacted because they expected me to do it. That’s what I was out
there for. I wasn’t any hero. They’re pros and they were good ball players. I wish there
was more footage, film footage, of some of those games. 3:14
Interviewer: “But, the cameras were there on occasion, right?”
They were there on occasion, right. I remember seeing the only motion picture, so to
speak, it was the Kalamazoo Klouters, I’m sure you’re aware of that aren’t you?
Interviewer: “We have a whole list of all the teams, yes.”
It’s one that Kalamazoo put out and that’s the one thing we’ve seen in the last few years
here, but there wasn’t a lot. There were stills, but think back to what film was like then.
9
�My colored pictures that I took in the early fifties are kind of faded. 3:15
Interviewer: “ So, lets go through some of the games you played. You got through
the first one, and I imagine your confidence level must have gotten better, so what
were the other games like?”
Well, I played that first game in center field, but I actually was a catcher, I had been
made into a catcher, and one of the first games I caught, Marge Silvestri was pitching and
I’m not exaggerating, this was overhand, she had a drop ball that dropped 8-12 inches
and of course I didn’t have any experience calling a game so to speak, so she called the
game from the mound and told me what she was going to throw, and we won. That was a
big thrill too, catching, I came through it pretty good. I don’t have any trouble with my
knees so to speak and the only thing I have is a crooked finger right here that was
dislocated and never put back in, but I loved catching once I got into it. 3:16
Interviewer: “I never could understand it myself. I was a pitcher.”
You’re part of the game. With every pitch you’re part of the game.
Interviewer: “What were some of the games like? You quoted one already.”
I have a problem pulling that out. They were competitive. I don’t think I specify any
particular games. I can’t.
Interviewer: “Well, who were the main rivals?”
Oh, the main rivals, toward the end—Fort Wayne, Fort Wayne always had a good team,
Rockford always had a good team, I think those were the main rivals as I remember.
Interviewer: “The one game that Beans was talking about, you were catching. Let’s
go into detail about that particular game.”
Well, here’s the deal that happened. Mamie Redman was pretty much the regular
catcher and I never—my statistics—I caught a lot of games, but Mamie would go back to
college when the playoffs started, so I was thrown in as the catcher. She was much more
experienced than I was and I tell her to this day—“Mamie, I could hit better and run
faster”. 3:17 So, Mamie went back to college and I was thrown in to be the catcher and
it was a championship game in the playoffs that year that Beansie pitched and it was in
Kalamazoo and it was forty degrees. It was really cold, really cold. Anyway, and I don’t
want to take away from her story, but she struck out that last batter and we won it. That
was probably both of our biggest thrills.
Interviewer. “What about the tension? That was the playoffs, what did you
experience?”
10
�A lot of tension. The one thing that I always thought and I still think to this day,
catcher’s gloves were hard to break in and we used the regular catcher’s glove—hard to
break in and they were expensive. The first one I bought, which we had to buy ourselves,
burned up in the fire at Bigelow and I had to buy another one. 3:18 Well, it wasn’t
broken in and Beansie thought the ball popped out of my mitt too much. I had a crease in
it and in fact, that glove is in the museum here in town now and you can still see that
crease. When they had that exhibit I noticed it and I could never work that out. They
weren’t as flexible as today’s. Anyway, that three-two pitch that she threw, there was a
lot of tension. Beansie was kind of nonchalant on the mound, tall, both she and Connie
Wisnewski probably were two of the taller ones in the league. Anyway, she was
nonchalant and she fired it and it stuck in my glove. That ball is in Cooperstown today,
right where it should be. 3:19
Interviewer: “What were the crowds like when you first started?”
They were phenomenal. 10,000 people at South Field, I don’t know where they put them
all, but going back, that’s wartime again. Tickets were cheap, people didn’t have cars,
but it was on the near south side and a lot of people could walk to the games, including
me. Anyway, it really, really was—I think it hit its real popularity in the late 40’s after
the war, but then as cars became more available and television hit the scene, it had an
affect on it. I think historians say that television and availability of the auto, really
changed the success of the league. 3:20
Interviewer: “Just a quick question, how much was your salary working as a
professional?”
I think it was fifty-five dollars a week, which wasn’t bad.
Interviewer: “That was a lot of money back then.”
It was a lot of money back then, yes.
Interviewer: “And that was helping to supplement your family, your mother?”
Right. Keep me going. As you get a little older and in your teens, you need things. You
think you do anyway.
Interviewer: “What did you do with your money?”
Well, I don’t think I had that much, I’m sure. While I was playing, my mother had
remarried, so I had a stepfather, so my money I used for myself. Whatever I needed. I
think I bought a car. A hundred dollar whopper.
Interviewer: “While you were playing as a professional baseball player, did you get
an opportunity for travel?” 3:21
11
�Yes we did, we traveled a lot on road trips. One thing I will say—even when I was
batgirl, after my dad died Dotty Hunter was a remarkable woman, she was a Canadian,
I’m sure you know more about her maybe than I do—anyway, she was out chaperone and
I think in the summer of 1948, she took me on a road trip and I think it was to Racine,
Wisconsin. Now I hadn’t, we didn’t travel back then, and the one thing I remember
about it—I was there and somebody famous died. She took care of me—in 1948 I was
fourteen. I had a room in a hotel, with a cardboard suitcase with stickers on it. It was a
wonderful experience. 3:22
Interviewer: “Later on you’re playing professionally, do you travel also?”
We traveled either by bus or the last couple years, I think we were in these cars and on
the side of one of the cars it said, “Here come the Grand Rapids Chicks”.
Interviewer: “So, during that period of time then, it was the first time you had been
outside Grand Rapids?”
Well, very far outside Grand Rapids. When my dad died in 1947, he was buried in
Allendale, but no we didn’t do that—you didn’t have drive-in, you didn’t have
McDonald’s, you didn’t have all that stuff.
Interviewer: “Did you travel out of the country?”
No, I never did.
Interviewer: “I know they had the American and the Cuban leagues.”
I think Beansie did. 3:23
Interviewer: “You had mentioned earlier about the crowds being huge, 10,000
people. Did you notice the drop off?”
Absolutely, I noticed it to the point where, as 1952 was approaching, I was thinking as
the crowds were dropping off, I might never have the opportunity to play because they
might end the league and by 1954 we could really see that coming. One of the things I
remember, was one of my last paychecks was handed out to me in one dollar bills. That
tells you a lot. That even told me a lot as a kid because I was only nineteen when this
was all over. 3:24
Interviewer: “I know that when we interviewed Rosemary, she was taken
completely by surprise of course and she only played at the last.”
Yes, she was only there the last three months or so and that was the last season. No, I
wasn’t taken by surprise at all. There were rumblings about this—they tried different
cities, but each city had its core fan base. There were fan clubs and all that and it didn’t
surprise me, really at all. I could see it coming.
12
�Interviewer: “Well, if you did see it coming, were you thinking about alternatives?”
3:25
Probably, quietly—what I did during the years that I played—in the winter I would work
at Wilson athletic goods—I think that was the only place I worked. It was a job you
could get making golf clubs, putting grips on them—a dirty job, a dirty job, standing in a
spot where the glue would drip and your shoes would be stuck to the floor, but when I
think back on that, it was piecework and it was good money—good money. When it was
over with I had to do something and I had been encouraged—I was a good student in
high school and I had been encouraged to do something. Well, Beansie got into x-ray, I
don’t know how she did, but she encouraged me and I got into it and actually worked at
it—I started in 1955 with my training, that went through 1957 and then I became an RT,
a Registered Technologist, and then after that I started going to night school and then I
while I was going to night school, I worked for Dr. Stonehouse and Dawson, right over
here in the Medical Arts building. I completed Community College and then I went back
to Butterworth Hospital and I got into the teaching program there, of x-ray students.
3:26 I had a degree then etc. I probably shouldn’t say this, but I got very disillusioned
in the 70’s and I might have been an activist too in the 70’s, but I just was dismayed with
patient care. That was after Medicare had come in and the situation kind of changed, but
we won’t go into that. Anyway, then I left that and I went to work for a person injury
attorney in town. Bill Reamon, he has passed away, but he was one of the hot shots in
town and I had a lot of respect for him. I worked for him from 1972 through 1977 and
then that firm split and then I did a lot of work for other attorneys because I had learned
to put together a settlement brochure that was quite popular with them at that time. 3:27
I worked for Bill up through 1988 part time, but also in 1981 I started doing estate sales
in town. I was always interested in antiques so, I was doing estate sales and I am still
doing them today. In fact I’m working on a big one right now. 3:28
Interviewer: “Looking back on the last year, 1954, you said that you heard the
rumbling and you kind of figured that this was starting to happen and you started
to think about what you are going to do next. How did it actually happen to you?
How did you physically know? Was it a letter? How did you know that it was over
with?”
I think it was through the press. I don’t remember a letter or anything. 3:29 Maybe, but
I don’t know. If there was one—in 1978 I donated all my stuff to the public museum
here and it would be in there if there was. I don’t remember that.
Interviewer. “What was your reaction?”
Well, I expected it. You can’t deny what you expect can you? It wasn’t the end of the
world for me. I was nineteen years old and I had to do something with my life anyway—
the funs not going to go on forever, right? Maybe, if you get the right job. Anyway I just
went on. Beansie was terribly disappointed and she expressed that to you, and I’m sure a
13
�lot of the others were too. It was like—it was a fact of life, but she stayed here and she
has done well here in town. 3:29
Interviewer: “Looking back, how do you think the specific experience of baseball
affected you and the person you are today?”
Well, I think probably significant to that was and to how it affected me was that it made
me competitive, but I think in a good way. It also taught me winning and losing and
winning isn’t everything. The way you lose can mean a lot too. I said that before about
winning and losing and competitive—having the opportunity to meet all these wonderful
women, who at that time that the league ended, we had no idea that all this would be
happening. It was over, it was over, but as out association got going and we got—I only
saw the local people here after that, but when the association got going, we have had
more fun at these reunions than you can believe. 3:30 I wish some of you could have
been at the reunion in Fort Wayne in, I want to say, 1984. There was more enthusiasm
there and more good times. There were other ones too, we had a wonderful one in Grand
Rapids in 2001 which Dolly Wisniewski was the chair person of and she said we helped
her, but I don’t know if we did that much, but basically it taught me a lot. It taught me
how to travel, how to pack a suitcase, which I don’t know today, how to eat out, because
we didn’t eat out, I didn’t anyway. My family didn’t and yours probably too. Anyway, it
matured me in a lot of ways. 3:31
Interviewer: “ If you look back on that time when girls, women didn’t really have a
whole lot of options. You could basically become of course a mother, a homemaker,
you could become a nurse, perhaps a teacher, but there weren’t a whole lot of other
things available. After the women’s professional baseball that seemed to change
and there are baseball teams and there are girl’s sports and whatnot. How much do
you think your experience and the experience of the baseball league had on girls
doing things today?” 3:32
Well, I’m led to believe that it had a great effect. My personal experience or contacts
haven’t shown me, other than what I have read or seen, but I guess it’s like Title IX or
whatever, and all this and I have a good friend who taught in college and she is a good
example of this. She had the opportunity to go to college right out of high school and she
could either be a nurse, a teacher or homemaker. Well, she wanted to be an engineer, but
women didn’t do that so, she became a teacher and had a successful career. She has
enlightened me about a lot of the changes because she taught at the local college here.
3:33 I see changes—I’m watching this Olympic team and I’m watching even some
sandlot stuff and there’s a lot of women out there that could be playing baseball and they
have tried it, but it doesn’t catch on and I’ve said, I don’t think it ever will. It might in
another hundred years or something and I want to stress something—there were good ball
players, but there are today too, but the skirts, the uniform, the timing, it’s in a little
pocket there of history where it fit in perfectly and I don’t know where your going to find
another pocket like that. You could make some changes that would be significant, but
this was wartime and wartime then was a lot different than wartime now--much different.
3:34
14
�Interviewer: “Penny Marshall decided to make the movie called “A League of
Their Own”. How were you contacted about that? How did you find out about it?”
I wasn’t personally, but June Peppis in Kalamazoo, she had started the players
association and we were getting together someplace and having a great time once a year
or twice a year. Anyway, she had these two writers come over one year, I don’t
remember their names, but they developed the storyline, never dreaming it would lead
into this, but it did. I don’t know how Penny Marshall got involved myself, but I do
remember in Cooperstown in 1988 when they recognized us, that Penny Marshall was
there. What a brilliant mind. 3:35 She’s brilliant and the way she put together that
movie and all the little twists and innuendos and everything else—it’s phenomenal—even
to “There’s no crying in baseball”, I don’t think anybody had said that before had they to
your knowledge? Anyway, we didn’t even dream at that point yet before the movie, what
it meant to other people as whole, as a unit there.
Interviewer: “I know and I’ve been told this by other baseball player, the storyline
itself was very much fictional account, but overall, did the film express, did it show
the experience?”
I think it showed the experience beautifully, but I think that the experience that it
depicted was more at the beginning of the league. I’m not sure why I say the, I just feel
that way. I think it did an exceptional job. Then to get gals that could play ball and all—
it was wonderful. 3:36 It was wonderful and it’s going to be a movie that’s going to be
around forever I’m sure. It’s going to be a good fill in forever, isn’t it?
Interviewer: “I think so and it kind of becomes like the 1940’s classics—it has the
flavor of that period and it doesn’t have all the stuff you see in so many movies
today. It stands on it’s own. How did the movie affect the association, affect you
and the association?” 3:37
The movie had a fantastic effect on the association, not just monetary, although there was
some there, but it found players that were off in somewhere, although there had been
great searches trying to locate people. It strengthened the association and almost gave the
association a purpose. I sometimes struggle with that—what’s the association s purpose
right now? Well, it’s to perpetuate the league, but I’m one of the youngest. Rosemary, I
said, is younger than I, but I was one of the youngest that was around from the beginning.
It isn’t going to be many more years—the associate members are beginning to take over
control, which has to be, but they’ve been around long enough where they’re picking up
the stories etc. It’s hard to put into a few words what the experience meant to each and
every one of them. To Beansie it meant getting out of Okalahoma, to me, I’ve always
been here. I went to South High School, played on the same South thing and the
connection with Jerry Ford—I’m into Grand Rapids history. 3:38
Interviewer: “That’s why you get along so well with Gordon Olson. He has a love
for this place.”
15
�Yes, he’s done a lot for us too. There are a lot of people who have stepped up and really
made us feel like somebody again as we get into our older years.
Interviewer: “I think one of the things that I found as a documentary film maker,
I’ve done films about the Flying Tigers, film about the Red Arrow and during the
experience itself you know you’re doing something and in your case your playing
baseball and your enjoying it and all that, but you don’t think in terms of what it is
going to mean fifty years from now.” 3:39
Absolutely not ever had a thought that way.
Interviewer: “But at the same time I think it’s important that historians do take the
tie and sit back say, “Guess what, this had an effect and this happened because of
what you did during that period.” A time when you were just a teenager.”
I was just a teenager, but I’ve had a good life since. I haven’t—I participated in the
meeting and the association and the reunions etc., but it hasn’t encompassed my life like
some others.
Interviewer: “But it’s an important part of your life.”
I haven’t forgotten and I never will. I know that dad would have been proud of me had
he lived to see me playing. 3:40
Interviewer: “I think it’s important that he encouraged you to begin with.”
That was and the boys in the neighborhood added to it too. I remember about ten days
before dad died, it was in November, he had me out between the houses in our
neighborhood where I grew up, throwing a football. Interesting—that was almost his last
day of consciousness. He had just come home from the hospital and he was built-up a
little bit.
Interviewer: “But your mom got a chance to see your success.”
She wasn’t interested in baseball, not at all. I think she knew though—one thing she said,
I remember and it was when I graduated from Community College, she said, “You’re the
first person in the family to get a degree.” It was only an Associates Degree, but it was a
degree, it was putting two years together. I think she was, but I don’t think she ever came
over to see a game. I’m not sure about that, maybe she did. 3:41
Interviewer: “Do you have other family?”
No, I have cousins that I don’t know—not really.
Interviewer: “I’m an only child also.”
You miss a lot.
16
�Interviewer: “You do, but on the other hand there’s a comfort level being by
yourself that have families don’t have.”
That is true. You think a little differently.
Interviewer. “I think so and if you actually take time to improve yourself and your
independence, it strengthens you, but I have very close friends.”
I do too, a lot of wonderful friends and that means a lot.
Interviewer: “Are there any thoughts that you want to add?”
No, I can’t think of any unless you want to ask me more questions. I feel like I did a
decent job for you. 3:42
Interviewer: “This has been a wonderful time.”
Do you tell everyone that?
Interviewer: “No, but each one is that unique.”
We are all different, right. Get Dolly going and you will enjoy her.
Interviewer: “Thank you very much and good-bye”
Thank you Frank, it was nice meeting you. 3:42
17
�18
�
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Title
A name given to the resource
All-American Girls Professional Baseball League Interviews
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Grand Valley State University. History Department
Description
An account of the resource
The All-American Girls Professional Baseball League was started by Philip Wrigley, owner of the Chicago Cubs, during World War II to fill the void left by the departure of most of the best male baseball players for military service. Players were recruited from across the country, and the league was successful enough to be able to continue on after the war. The league had teams based in Wisconsin, Illinois, Indiana and Michigan, and operated between 1943 and 1954. The 1954 season ended with only the Fort Wayne, South Bend, Grand Rapids, Kalamazoo, and Rockford teams remaining. The League gave over 600 women athletes the opportunity to play professional baseball. Many of the players went on to successful careers, and the league itself provided an important precedent for later efforts to promote women's sports.
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/484">All-American Girls Professional Baseball League Collection, (RHC-58)</a>
Rights
Information about rights held in and over the resource
<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Subject
The topic of the resource
Sports for women
World War, 1939-1945--Personal narratives, American
All-American Girls Professional Baseball League--Personal narratives
Oral history
Baseball players--Minnesota
Baseball players--Indiana
Baseball players--Wisconsin
Baseball players--Michigan
Baseball players--Illinois
Baseball for women--United States
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University Libraries, Special Collections and University Archives, 1 Campus Drive, Allendale, MI, 49401
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
RHC-58
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
video/mp4
application/pdf
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Moving Image
Text
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2017-10-02
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Smither, James
Boring, Frank
Relation
A related resource
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Oral History
A resource containing historical information obtained in interviews with persons having firsthand knowledge.
Dublin Core
The Dublin Core metadata element set is common to all Omeka records, including items, files, and collections. For more information see, http://dublincore.org/documents/dces/.
Identifier
An unambiguous reference to the resource within a given context
RHC-58_MJenkins
Title
A name given to the resource
Jenkins, Marilyn M. (Interview transcript and video), 2008
Creator
An entity primarily responsible for making the resource
Jenkins, Marilyn
Description
An account of the resource
Marilyn Jenkins was born in Grand Rapids, Michigan in 1934. She grew up in Grand Rapids and played baseball with family and friends, and played softball with the neighborhood kids. When the Grand Rapids Chicks arrived in 1945, she talked her way into a job with the team and quickly became their batgirl, a job she held through the 1951 season. She played as a batgirl from 1945 thru 1951. Upon graduating high school in 1952, she became eligible to play in the All American Girls Professional Baseball League and went on to play with the Grand Rapids Chicks from 1952 to 1954 as a catcher.
Contributor
An entity responsible for making contributions to the resource
Boring, Frank (Interviewer)
Publisher
An entity responsible for making the resource available
Grand Valley State University. University Libraries. Special Collections & University Archives
Subject
The topic of the resource
Oral history
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Video recordings
All-American Girls Professional Baseball League--Personal narratives
Baseball for women--United States
Baseball
Sports for women
World War, 1939-1945
Baseball players--Michigan
Women
Language
A language of the resource
eng
Rights
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<a href="http://rightsstatements.org/page/InC/1.0/?language=en">In Copyright</a>
Type
The nature or genre of the resource
Moving Image
Text
Relation
A related resource
Veterans History Project (U.S.)
Date
A point or period of time associated with an event in the lifecycle of the resource
2008-07-01
Source
A related resource from which the described resource is derived
<a href="https://gvsu.lyrasistechnology.org/repositories/2/resources/484">All-American Girls Professional Baseball League Collection, (RHC-55)</a>
Format
The file format, physical medium, or dimensions of the resource
application/pdf
video/mp4