WOMEN AND SPORT IN THE TWENTIES AND THIRTIES Helen Lenshyj Pendant les anne'es 20 et 30 au time, so we just thought, 'what do ability and her obvious relish for Canada, les femmes commenc2rent h we care about what you think . competition were labelled tomboy- pratiquer les sports d'e'quipe, surtout we want to play, we'll play!' " In ish, she perceived these as advan- la balle-molle et le ballon-panier: another sense, the lives of these tages in terms of friendship, since toutefois, des barri6res a leur women are representative of many they allowed her to enjoy a cama- participation compl&tedans le of their female contemporaries - raderie with the boys and men in her domaine du sport existaient encore. athletes whose achievements re- family and neighbourhood that was L'engagement de quelques femmes main unrecorded in a literature unusual for a girl in those days. dans le monde des sports, domine' par which still retains much of its early "Anything the boys could do, I les hommes, fut ne'anmoins preoccupation with male-domi- could do, too, and do it as well as exceptionnel. Cet article fait revivre nated, professional sport. they could . I didn't feel any dif- les activite's de trois de ces femmes: Doris Butwell Craig was born in ferent." Remembering ice hockey Doris Butwell Craig, Gladys Gigg 1908 in the Humber Bay area of games on the Humber River, she Ross, et Hilda Thomas Smith. Toronto. One of four children, she said, "They knocked me down just had a sister, Laura, who was four- the same as they knocked each teen years her senior, and two other down . that didn't bother The twenties and thirties have brothers close to her own age. me." The idea of contact sports, been called, by some historians, the Doris attended Humber Bay Public however, did bother Laura, who did "Golden Age" of women's sports in Scnool and Central Commerce. not share Doris's love of games like Canada. Others have written his- After completing high school, she basketball and softball. "All that , tories of sport and physical activity did secretarial work until her mar- roughness, people sliding into you as if women were either invisible riage in 1932. and hurting your shins" - this was or incapable of participating - Doris was labelled a tomboy by not Laura's idea of fun. Doris at- except perhaps as spectators. It is family members from a young age. tributed this to personality and age , true that there was a remarkable Quite early in life, she discovered differences, noting that Laura did growth of interest in women's team that climbing to the top of "a great not have the advantage of growing sports, especially softball and bas- big tree" in the backyard was an up in the flapper era - the "crazy ketball, at thistime, but barriers still effective way to avoid doing the twenties"; Laura was a wife and existed to women's participation. In dishes. Other escapades included mother by this time. many respects, the experiences of scaling a windmill and hopping a Doris began playing softball when Doris Butwell Craig, Gladys Gigg freight train for a mile or so. Fam- she was about twelve. Her brother's Ross, and Hilda Thomas Smith were ily reaction curbed some but not all novel training method was obvious- exceptional. As Gladys explained, of Doris's adventures. Reflecting on ly a key factor: "He stood me in "We were into sports which the tomboy label, Doris said, "I am front of double garage doors that weren't common for girls at that and I'm not." While her athletic were mostly glass and he would VOLUME 4, NUMBER 3, SPRING 1983 15 say, 'you can't miss it now, you achievement." Her other sporting DORIS know!' and I didn't miss it! 1~never successes at school included a gold missed it! We never broke a glass medal in the Ontario high schools' BUT WELL on that door." These sessions, Doris competition for standing broad claims, taught her to concentrate - jump. For a short time, too, Doris CRAiG'S "thinking down to her fingers," in was coached in diving by Olympic her words - and she attributed her swimming coach Ab Shilcock, until NHLEPIC subsequent success as "a pretty a back injury curtailed her training good hitter" to co-ordination and in this area. agility. Doris first played basketball for During her school years Doris the Lakeside Athletic Club in the played in interschool basketball 1924-25 season. The club was spon- OBVIOUS competition. As a participant in re- sored by Silverwood Dairies, with gional tournaments, she travelled the company providing uniforms RELISH all over Ontario and recalled that and equipment. In the days before the level of play in this team was the diamond was enclosed with a FOR more demanding. "You really had fence, the practice was to "pass the to play . we played boys' rules hat" at games; later, admission was GOMPETllTlOM . and I can remember mother charged. It was at the games that counting over one hundred bruises Doris received several job offers, WERE on me!" Doris viewed the intro- presumably from employers who duction of men's rules and the inter- saw publicity opportunities in hav- ADVANfAGES est taken by male coaches as "a ing a secretary who was a public breakthrough" in girls' team sports figure. Newspaper coverage of in the twenties. She explained her women's sports did, in fact, make PM PERMS position in terms of commitment to Doris and her teammates public fig- the game. While acknowledging ures; columns written by former OF that there was, of course, a place for athletes Alexandrine Gibb and recreational sports in women's Phyllis Griffiths appeared regularly FRIENDSHIP lives, she believed that good ath- in two Toronto newspapers at this letes needed the opportunity for se- time, and a third, written by rious training and competition and Bobbie Rosenfeld, appeared in the should not be limited by the 1930s. One offer impressed Doris "girls1-rules" mentality. Critics at more than all the others: the chance this time, however, were agonizing to play softball for a Chicago team, over the alleged "masculinizing" for $60 per week. At the time, Doris effects of serious competitive sports earned $16 per week as a secretary, on the bodies and the personalities and her status in softball was strict- of young women. These critics ly amateur. Yet she didn't even dis- emphasized the dangers of men's cuss the offer with her family. "No, rules and the risks to female players you just didn't do that," she ex- when men, who did not understand plained. women's "peculiar physiology," Gladys Gigg Ross grew up in acted as their managers and North Bay, one of a family of ten coaches. Little of this opposition ap- children. A childhood incident served pears to have affected players like to bring her athletic ability to Doris, who viewed men's role in the attention of Claude Kewley, a women's team sports as a positive sports writer who also coached trend. girls' track and field. Kewley hap- Apart from the basketball pro- pened to notice the nine-year-old gram, the physical education of- Gladys running down the street, fered by the school system did not pursued by her sixteen-year-old leave much impression on Doris. brother, and was impressed with She remarked of the gym exercises, her remarkable speed. In the fol- "I used to just walk through those lowing years, Gladys developed an things." Similarly, the contest often impressive record as an all-round recommended for girls - throwing athlete, scoring the most points in the ball for distance - posed no high-school field-day events for four particular challenge to a softball years as well as playing basketball player: "I could always throw the and softball. ball the farthest. I always won that. A 1933 newspaper report of the I didn't think that was any great North Bay collegiate field-day pro- ANADIAN WOMAN S'I'IJI)IESIl,ES CAHIERS DE LA FEMME gram showed interesting differ- when the first British Empire was appointed northern convener ences between boys' and girls' Games were held in Hamilton, On- of the Women's Amateur Athletic events. The longest race for girls tario, four girls, including Gladys, Federation (WAAF),Ontario was 65 yards, compared to 880 were ready to compete. This was branch. At this time, too she was yards for boys. Throwing events for at the time when there was a move- writing a sports column in the girls were limited to the baseball and ment among American and some North Bay Nugget - "In the Fem- basketball throw (for distance), Canadian women to eliminate inine Realm of Sport. " She played whereas boys had javelin and shot- competition from all levels of girls' softball until 1944 and continued in put events. Gladys's best perform- and women's sports, on the grounds executive roles for many years ances were in sprints and high that females were not physically after. It was in 1953, when Gladys jump. Her introduction to jumping and emotionally capable of coping assumed the presidency of the pro- came about when Ethel Cather- with the strain and excitement. vincial Women's Softball Union, wood, the 1928 Olympic gold med- Other concerns included women that it became, as Bobbie Rosenfeld alist, was competing in North Bay, playing during menstruation and expressed it in her column, "not and Kewley urged Gladys to jump the unsuitability of male coaches for only a government for the women, with Ethel.