All American Girls Professional Baseball League
- Sports And Violence - insults; however, warranted they may be, to provoke boys to prove their manhood. This can cause...
- Women In Sports - in federally funded school programs, which included the sports programs. The current statistic of...
Submitted by frink111 on 06/30/2008 05:21 PM
- Category: Sports
- Words: 2077
- Pages: 9
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- Popularity Rank: 1462
All American Girls Professional Baseball League
In December, 1941, the Japanese bombed Pearl Harbor causing the United States to join World War II. By the summer of 1943, 10 million men had entered the armed forces. The major league baseball teams lost half their players to the war while the minor league teams lost 3000 players to either the armed forces or to war related jobs. At that time, only 9 of the 26 minor league teams had enough players to play baseball.
Philip K. Wrigley, owner of the Chicago Cubs and also president of William Wrigley, Jr., a chewing gum company, was fearful of the demise of baseball. In the fall of 1942, Wrigley assigned a three man team from the Cubs organization to explore the possibility of a female professional baseball team. By January, 1943, the committee brought back positive results for professional softball teams. In February of 1943, Wrigley presented his plans to seven other National League team owners, hoping to persuade them to let women play in their stadiums while the men's teams were at away games. When the owners did not feel there was enough time or money for fans to watch both men's and women's professional teams, Wrigley decided to turn to medium sized cities within 100 miles of Chicago. While pitching the idea of a women's professional team to potential backers, Wrigley said:
"We will select the kind of players that
people will want to see in action. Then
we will groom them, to make sure them
are acceptable. It won't be like the bad
old days of peep shows and Bloomer Girls
. . .The League will be good for the country,
good for the war effort and good for you."
He was speaking to the leaders of South Bend, IN, Rockford, IL, Kenosha and Racine, WI. Each of...
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