Christopher Richards

Women in Sports
Womens participation in sport has a long history. It is a history marked by division and
discrimination but also one filled with major accomplishments by female athletes and important
advances for gender equality and the empowerment of women and girls.
In the ancient Olympics 776 b.c, women were not even allowed to watch the competitions.
However, the precise history of women sports can be traced back to the late nineteenth and early
twentieth century. In early 20th century, a separate women's athletic event, the Heraea Games
featuring footraces for women, held every four years was eventually developed. But there was
only few women participated in the sports. Although married women were excluded from the
Olympics even as spectators, Cynisca won an Olympic game as owner of a chariot (champions
of chariot races were owners not riders), as did Euryleonis, Belistiche, Zeuxo, Encrateia and
Hermione, Timareta, Theodota and Cassia.

The educational committees of the French Revolution (1789) included intellectual, moral, and
physical education for girls and boys alike. With the victory of Napoleon less than twenty years
later, physical education was reduced to military preparedness for boys and men. In Germany,
the physical education of Guts Muths (1793) included girl's education. This included the
measurement of performances of girls. This led to women's sport being more actively pursued in
Germany than in most other countries. When the Fdration Sportive Fminine
Internationale was formed as an all-womens international organization it had a German male
vice-president, and German international success in elite sports.
Women's sports in the late 1800s focused on correct posture, facial and bodily beauty, muscles,
and health.

Some notable achievements of women in the nineteen century are as follows:

In 1567 Mary Queen of Scots is said to be the first woman to play golf in Scotland. She
scandalizes the country when she plays golf a few days after her husband Lord Darnley's murder.
1704 Feisty Sarah Kemble Knight undertakes a solo horseback journey from Boston to New
York.
1811The first women's golf tournament is held at Musselburgh, Scotland.
1856 Catherine Beecher publishes the first exercise manual for women.
1875 Wellesley College opens and requires physical education as part of the curriculum.
Annie Oakley beats her future husband, champion marksman Frank Butler, at a shooting
competition.
1884 The women's singles competition begins at Wimbledon. Maud Watson is the first
champion.

Christopher Richards

1895 Annie Smith Peck is the first woman to climb the Matterhorn.
The first Olympic Games in the modern era, which were in 1896 were not open to women, but
since then the number of women who have participated in the Olympic Games have increased
dramatically. In 1896, Baron Pierre de Coubertin, founder of the modern Olympics, stated: No
matter how toughened a sportswoman may be, her organism is not cut out to sustain certain
shocks. Such stereotypes fuelled gender-based discrimination in physical education and in
recreational and competitive sport, sporting organizations and sport media.
During the early nineteen century the following outstanding sports performance of women and
women organizations are noted below.
1897 Lena Jordan becomes the first person to perform a triple somersault on the trapeze.
1900 Women compete in the Paris Olympics in golf, tennis, and croquet.
1901 Annie Taylor is the first person to go over Niagara Falls in a barrel.
1902 Since there was no women's competition, figure skater Madge Syers of Britain enters the
men's world championships and places second. In 1908, she would win the first women's
Olympic gold medal.
1907 St. Louis, Mo. becomes the home of the first organized women's bowling league.
1914 The American Athletic Union (AAU) allows women to register for the national swimming
championships.
1917 Lucy Diggs Slowe becomes the first African-American woman to win a national title in any
sport when she wins the first women's title at the American Tennis Association (ATA) national
tournament.
1922 The AAU opens track and field events to women.
1924 Figure skating is the only sport open to women at the first Winter Olympic Games.
1926 Gertrude Ederle becomes the first woman to swim the English Channel.

In 1916 the Amateur Athletic Union (AAU) held its first national championship for women.
Few women competed in sports in Europe and North America until the late nineteenth and early
twentieth centuries, as social changes favored increased female participation in society as equals
with men. Although women were technically permitted to participate in many sports, relatively
few did. There was often disapproval of those who did, for a variety of social and psychological
reasons that are still poorly understood.

Christopher Richards

"Bicycling has done more to emancipate women than anything else in the world." Susan B.
Anthony said "I stand and rejoice every time I see a woman ride on a wheel. It gives women a
feeling of freedom and self-reliance."

The modern Olympics had female competitors from 1900 onward, though women at first
participated in considerably fewer events than men. Women first made their appearance in the
Olympic Games in Paris in 1900. That year, 22 women competed in tennis, sailing, croquet,
equestrian, and golf. As of the IOC-Congress in Paris 1914 a woman's medal had formally the
same weight as a man's in the official medal table. This left the decisions about women's
participation to the individual international sports federations. Concern over the physical strength
and stamina of women led to the discouragement of female participation in more physically
intensive sports, and in some cases led to less physically demanding female versions of male
sports. Thus netball was developed out of basketball and softball out of baseball.

In response to the lack of support for women's international sport the Fdration Sportive
Fminine Internationale was founded in France. This organization initiated the Women's World
Games, which attracted participation of nearly 20 countries and was held four times between
1922 and 1934. The International Olympic Committee began to incorporate greater participation
of women at the Olympics in response. The number of Olympic women athletes increased over
five-fold in the period, going from 65 at the 1920 Summer Olympics to 331 at the 1936 Summer
Olympics.
Most early women's professional sports leagues foundered. This is often attributed to a lack of
spectator support. Amateur competitions became the primary venue for women's sports.
Throughout the mid-twentieth century, Communist countries dominated many Olympic sports,
including women's sports, due to state-sponsored athletic programs that were technically
regarded as amateur. The legacy of these programs endured, as former Communist countries
continue to produce many of the top female athletes. Germany and Scandinavia also developed
strong women's athletic programs in this period.

Some remarkable achievements are as follows:

1928 Women finally compete in Olympic track and field events.

Christopher Richards

1931 Virne Mitchell, pitcher, becomes the first woman in professional baseball. She strikes
out Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrigin an exhibition game. Baseball commissioner Kenesaw Mountain
Landisbans women from the sport later that year.
1932 Babe Didrikson wins the team championship singlehandedly at the AAU national track and
field meet.
1937 Conchita Cintron of Chile begins her bullfighting career in Mexico.
1943 The All American Girls' Baseball League was formed to fill ballparks emptied by baseball
players going to war.
1944 Swimmer Ann Curtis is the first woman to win the Sullivan Award.
1947 Barbara Washburn becomes the first woman to climb Mount McKinley.
1948 Alice Coachman is the first black woman to win an Olympic gold medal. She grabs her
gold in the high jump.
1948 Patty Berg and others found the Ladies' Professional Golf Association (LPGA).
1950 Florence Chadwick beats Gertrude Ederle's 1926 record for swimming the English
Channel.
1950 12-year-old Kathryn Johnson becomes the first girl to play Little League Baseball in
Corning, N.Y.
1952 Women and men compete together in Olympic equestrian events.
1953 Maureen Connolly becomes the first woman to win a Grand Slamall four major tennis
championships.
1954 16-year-old Canadian Marilyn Bell is the first person to swim across Lake Ontario.
1955 The first LPGA Championship is held.
1956 Althea Gibson is the first black person to win a tennis Grand Slam title when she wins the
French Championship (the future French Open).
1957 Althea Gibson becomes the top-ranked women's tennis player with Wimbledon and U.S.
Championships under her belt.
1959 Patty Berg hits a hole-in-one in the U.S. Women's Open. She's the first woman to score an
ace in a United States Golf Association tournament.
1960 Wilma Rudolph is the first woman to win three Olympic gold medals in track and field at
one Olympic Games.
1962 The National Women's Rowing Association is founded.
1964 Soviet gymnast Larissa Latynina completes her Olympic career with a total of 18 medals
more than any other athlete in Olympic history.
1966 Roberta Gibb becomes the first woman to run and finish the Boston Marathon. It's
unofficial since women weren't officially entered until 1972.
1968 Wyomia Tyus is the first woman to win two consecutive Olympic gold medals in the 100 m
dash.

Christopher Richards

1969 Diane Crump rides onto Hialeah Racetrack and becomes the first woman to ride in a United
States parimutuel race. The next year she would become the first woman to ride in the Kentucky
Derby.
Sharon Sites Adams is the first woman to sail solo across the Pacific Ocean.
1971 Women finally get the official nod to play five-player, full-court basketball.
1972 The U.S. Congress passes Title IX to foster more equitable federal financial aid to women's
sports programs

In the United States, female student participation in sports was remarkably encouraged by the
Title 9 Act in 1972, preventing gender discrimination and equal opportunity for women to
participate in sport at all levels. However, pressure from sports funding bodies has also improved
gender equality in sports. From 1970s, tennis became the most popular professional female sport.
But, women's professional team sports achieved popularity for the first time in the 1990s,
particularly in basketball and football. This popularity has been asymmetric, being strongest in
the U.S., certain European countries and former Communist states. Thus, women's soccer was
originally dominated by the U.S., China, and Norway.

In 1990, Bernadette Mattox became the first female Division I coach of a men's basketball team
at the University of Kentucky. A year later, goaltender Jenny Hanley of Hamline
University became the first women to play on a men's college ice hockey team. By 1994, the
number of females playing sports in high school had increased threefold since Title IX was
implemented, and ground was broken for the Women's Basketball Hall of Fame, the first such
hall of fame devoted to exclusively women athletes. In 1996 the number of female high school
athletes reached 2.4 million, including 819 football players, 1164 wrestlers, and 1471 ice hockey
players

Today, women participate professionally and as amateurs in practically every major sport, though
the level of participation typically lessens when it comes to the more violent contact sports.
However, few schools have women's programs in American football, boxing or wrestling. This is
how the history of women sports evolved and developed.

Among the many remarkable achievements are those of Helene Madison of the United States of
America, the first woman to swim the 100-yard freestyle in one minute at the 1932 Olympics;
Maria-Teresa de Filippis of Italy, the first woman to compete in a European Grand Prix auto race
in 1958; Nawal El Moutawakel of Morocco, the first woman from an Islamic nation to win an
Olympic medal for the 400-metre hurdles at the 1984 Olympics; and Tegla Loroupe of Kenya,
who in 1994 became the first African woman to win a major marathon.1 Women have taken up

Christopher Richards

top leadership positions in sport, such as Presidents and Secretaries-General of National Olympic
Committees.
More and more women have also taken up employment opportunities in all areas of sport,
including as coaches, managers, officials and sport journalists. These achievements were made in
the face of numerous barriers based on gender discrimination. Women were often perceived as
being too weak for sport, particularly endurance sports, such as marathons, weightlifting and
cycling, and it was often argued in the past that sport was harmful to womens health,
particularly their reproductive health.
In the Caribbean many women perform with distinction in sports such as Jamaican Stafanie
Taylor has been the catalyst for West Indies womens cricket for the last three years. In 2011 and
2012, she copped the International Cricket Council (ICC) Womens Cricketer of the Year
award; however, in 2013, the hat-trick couldnt be completed. Shelly-Ann Fraser-Pryce is a
paragon of virtue on and off the track. Her attaining The International Association of Athletics
Federations (IAAF) Female World Athlete of the Year award for 2013 is testament to just how
much hard work pays off. She became the first Caribbean woman to win 100m Olympic gold in
Beijing, 2008, at age 21. Then came the 2009 World Championships in Berlin where she took
gold in the 100m and 4 x 100m relay.
The NAWIRA Caribbean Womens 15-a-side Rugby Championship, the North America and West
Indies Rugby Association. Seven-a-side rugby is growing inter-island sport, but the full 15-a-side
game is significantly more resource intensive and so it was only with the financial support of the
IRB that the first tournament took place in December 2003.
Only Trinidad and Jamaica took part in that first event, Trinidad winning over two legs in Port of
Spain. In September 2006 a second event was organized, this time in Kingston, Jamaica and
featuring Guyana. The hosts were again winners by the narrowest of margins.
The tournament now takes place annually, although the 2007 edition as cancelled at the last
minute owing to a hurricane hitting the Cayman Island where the tournament was due to take
place.
After 2009 NAWIRA was reorganized as NACRA (North America and Caribbean Rugby
Association) in order to better encourage participation by unions outside the English-speaking
West Indies. From 2010 the tournament became the NACRA Womens Rugby Championship.
However, a separate play-off for the Caribbean title was organized for the island teams taking
part.
According to Colin Croft More difficult to understand is the lack of appreciation of the females
in sports in 2011. Simply comparing the input and success of West Indies Women cricket teams
to those of their male counterparts seems like cheese to chalk. West Indies men have been way
behind in achievement.

Christopher Richards

The benefits of womens participation for sport and society In addition to benefits for women
and girls themselves, womens increased involvement can promote positive development in sport
by providing alternative norms, values, attitudes, knowledge, capabilities and experiences. The
contributions of women, particularly in leadership positions, can bring diversity and alternative
approaches and expand the talent base in areas such as management, coaching and sport
journalism. The participation of women and girls in sport challenges gender stereotypes and
discrimination, and can therefore be a vehicle to promote gender equality and the empowerment
of women and girls. In particular, women in sport leadership can shape attitudes towards
womens capabilities as leaders and decision-makers, especially in traditional male domains.
Womens involvement in sport can make a significant contribution to public life and community
development.

www.un.org/womenwatch/daw/public/women and sport.pdf

en.wikipedia.org/wiki/women's sports
www.infoplease.com/spot/womeninsportstimeline.html
icnsportsweb.com/important-facts-history-women.html
www.womenssportsfoundation.org/en/home/advocate/title-ix-and-issues/history-oftitle-ix/h

www.playcaribbeansports.com/category/women-in-sport/
en.wikipedia.org/wiki/caribbean_womens_rugby_championship
Excerpt from West Indies Women Cricketers are Caribbeans Sports Personalities for 2011!
DECEMBER 29, 2011 | BY KNEWS | FILED UNDER SPORTS