12 Supporting Black Women Athletes

Amira Rose Davis

In 1955, fifteen-year-old Wilma Rudolph stood anxiously on the track at the historic Franklin Field in Philadelphia. She was not nervous about her races—she had won those handily. Indeed, her entire team had enjoyed a banner day. Led by Rudolph’s nine victories, the small team of five high school girls from Tennessee State University’s summer development program had swept the entire competition and walked away with the Junior National Amateur Athletic Union title. No, Rudolph was nervous for another reason. Her coach, the infamous Ed Temple, had just asked the girls to go take a picture with two black celebrities who had attended the meet. As she approached Don Newcombe and Jack Robinson, she worried about the thickness of her southern accent and was glad she wouldn’t really have to talk. This was just a photo op, after all. What could these famous baseball players from the Brooklyn Dodgers possibly have to say to her?

Jack Robinson, as it turns out, had plenty to say. He pulled Rudolph aside and congratulated her on her victories. The two chatted for a few minutes, with Robinson complimenting her style of running and asking her about her family and life in Tennessee. Robinson was shocked to learn that Rudolph was still in high school and declared that she had a lot of potential. After pictures were taken, Robinson turned to Rudolph and gave her advice she would never forget. “You are a fascinating runner,” he told the future Olympic gold medalist and track legend. “Don’t let anything or anybody keep you from running. Keep running.”1 Those words stuck with Rudolph, and she turned them over and over in her head on the way back down to Tennessee. “I thought about Jackie Robinson and what he said, and for the first time in my life I had a black person I could look up to as a real hero,” she recalled. “Jackie Robinson after that day was my first black hero.”2

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This brief encounter between Jack Robinson and Wilma Rudolph is more than a cool photo or compelling historical footnote. Their meeting and conversation cast light on a seldom explored side of the legendary Jackie Robinson—his support and amplification of black women athletes.

Robinson’s respect for black women is well documented. He was fiercely devoted to his wife Rachel and constantly acknowledged her support and work. “She was my critic, my companion, my comforter and my inspiration,” he wrote about Rachel. “She was my driving force to make good in this world.”3 Robinson often extolled his love for his wife and cited her support as a way to remind young girls and women how important they were and how vital they were to the success and future of the race. Many of Robinson’s writings and speeches emphasized black women’s value in heteronormative domestic life, yet he also acknowledged their political and social contributions, declaring, for instance, that “Negro women have been the backbone of our freedom movement.”4

Robinson was not a vocal champion of gender equality in the way that he was a public voice on civil rights and electoral politics. Over the years, Robinson displayed a tension between a belief in traditional gender roles and a more progressive stance on women’s autonomy and employment. Much of this tension was within his own home and in reaction to Rachel’s ambition and tenacity. Rachel noted that being a “man, the main man, in a family of his own” carried a “profound appeal” for Jack.5 Yet Robinson’s vision of family life was at odds with Rachel’s own professional opportunities. He admitted that if he had his way, Rachel would not work outside of the home and struggled with her desire for a professional career for many years. However, it is very clear that Rachel influenced his evolution on gender roles. Writing at the end of his life, Robinson acknowledged his personal growth and said that he was very proud of his wife’s successful career.

Despite his personal struggle with Rachel’s career aspirations, Robinson respected, and at times even celebrated, other black women who were breaking into traditionally male professional spaces. Legendary author Toni Morrison attested to this when she reflected on meeting Robinson in the late 1960s to discuss his potential autobiography:

I already knew a great deal about the way many black men in that position often talked to black women who had a little power, which was to show the women that they really had none. Robinson was totally unlike that. He made no gestures to say “I’m more important than you; you have to accommodate me because I am a man.” . . . He played none of the usual gender games. He respected me, felt comfortable with me. In hindsight, he was one of the few black men I had business dealings with in those days with whom I did not have to watch myself.6

Robinson’s refusal to play the “usual gender games” was particularly apparent when it came to black women who were in sports.

Black Women in Our Sports

By the mid-twentieth century, black women and girls boasted a robust history of athletic participation. Black Americans understood sports to be a key space from which to refute their supposed inferiority, demonstrate the capabilities of the race, instill racial pride, and push for social and political equality. Competitive athletics for girls and women blossomed within black institutions. Still, black women, like their white counterparts, contended with prevailing notions that sports would make them less feminine and sexually deviant. Therefore, their participation was highly regulated by physical educators, coaches, and sports journalists, who constantly policed their appearances and behaviors.

The black press routinely covered women’s athletics and often featured articles and updates on prominent women athletes. Many of these features attempted to emphasize their athletic achievements alongside their femininity and heteronormativity. It was common to see an article on a black woman athlete in black periodicals such as Jet or Ebony that featured the athlete in a dress or powdering her face or engaging in domestic work. The coverage juxtaposed their “inherently masculine” athletic exploits with not-so-subtle assurances that they were still feminine.

As editor in chief of the short-lived Our Sports magazine, Robinson offered a different portrayal of black women athletes. Heralded by Robinson as the “first and only publication of its kind,” Our Sports offered readers a magazine that followed black athletes, from up-and-coming youth to the professional level. Robinson’s magazine always featured black women athletes in a wide array of sports. One issue highlighted the growth of black women wrestlers, while another featured a profile on a top fencer. Additionally, the coverage featured images of the athletes playing sports as opposed to dainty model-like poses. Pictures of black women golfing or bowling were accompanied by in-depth articles that discussed their athletic achievements and goals. As one column asserted, “No readers of Our Sports would raise an eyebrow or cause excitement by coming up with the right answers to such questions as ‘Who is Althea Gibson?’ ‘For what is Mae Faggs noted?’ ‘Can you identify Fanny Blankers-Koen, Maureen Connolly, The Bauer Sisters, Alice Coachman?’”7

Our Sports also went beyond showcasing athletes. The magazine amplified women in sports in a variety of ways and in doing so subtly created a space that welcomed and celebrated black women in many roles in the sports industry. Our Sports employed black women sportswriters and columnists and featured letters from black women readers. In one issue they even featured a spread titled “The Other Half of the Baseball Story” that featured the wives of well-known black major leaguers in order to give them due credit for the influence they had on their husbands’ careers. While the article certainly reinforced traditional gender norms on one hand (“behind every successful man is a good woman”), it also helped to highlight the range of black women’s involvement in sports and cast black women as an integral part of black major leaguers’ success.8 The amplification and support of black women—athletes or otherwise—in the pages of Our Sports reflected Robinson’s sustained respect for them and provided a model for more substantial coverage of black girls and women in the sporting world.

A Picture’s Worth a Thousand Words

In the years following Robinson’s integration of the majors, Negro League Baseball struggled to stay afloat. Major league teams were plucking up Negro League stars left and right, often with very little compensation sent to the former teams. With their stars in the majors and their fans following close behind, the audience and viability of the league waned. After the departure of Hank Aaron in 1952, Syd Pollock, owner of the Indianapolis Clowns, went in search of the next star—or at least someone who would attract fans back to the Negro Leagues. Pollock found his gate attraction in a semiprofessional baseball league where a black woman by the name of Toni Stone was turning heads.

In 1953 Toni Stone signed a contract with the Clowns, replacing Aaron at second base and officially gender integrating the Negro Leagues. Pollock played up the spectacle of his “gal guardian of second base” from his first press release, where he boasted that “the latest masculine enterprise to fall before the advance of wearers of skirts and panties is the baseball diamond.”9 Pollock’s bet paid off as thousands of fans packed into stadiums to see Stone play. The next year two more women, Connie Morgan and Mamie “Peanut” Johnson, would also enter the league.10

The presence of women in Negro League Baseball did not go over very well with many male sportswriters, despite their enthusiastic coverage of women’s sports in their press pages. The baseball women were a cause for concern. For a number of black sportswriters, many of whom had been fighting to integrate the majors for years, the sight of Stone, Morgan, and Johnson was irrefutable proof that the Negro Leagues had run its course. They argued that women in baseball emasculated black men and devalued the rugged masculinity of the sport. “It is indeed unfortunate that Negro baseball has collapsed to the extent that it has to tie itself to a woman’s apron strings to survive,” wrote one journalist. Another journalist agreed, arguing that “girls need to be run out of men’s baseball with a softly-padded rail for their own good and the good of the game.”11

Although Robinson was quite vocal about the poor state of the Negro Leagues, he never publicly admonished the women ball players. In fact, he did quite the opposite. When barnstorming with his All-Star team, they stopped in Baltimore to face off against the Clowns. Pollock used this opportunity to stage a mini photo shoot with Robinson and Connie Morgan. Robinson obliged and took it upon himself to give Morgan batting tips as well. The image of Morgan “learning tips from the pros” was widely circulated as a way to legitimize the women athletes. Pollock plastered the image on promotional posters, scorecards, and postcards. Robinson’s willingness to lend his image—and thus his tacit approval—to the promotion of the women athletes, as well as the Negro Leagues, was likely more supportive than any verbal statement or written column would ever be.

It also exemplifies the ways in which Robinson interacted with black women athletes. He respected them, amplified them, and offered support. However, this support was largely through photo opportunities and magazine spreads. Despite Robinson’s public platform and vocal engagements with civil rights, electoral politics, and more, he never discussed women athletes at length. This was partially because his respect for black women as athletes was a given and did not require any grand statement. But it was also because the plight of black women athletes seemed largely tangential to Robinson’s social concerns and political goals.

The Female Jackie Robinson

Even before he hung up his baseball cleats, Robinson enjoyed playing golf. After his retirement from professional baseball in 1956, golf became a more frequent pastime. Robinson was not the only legendary black athlete to enjoy a day on the links. Often he would golf alongside the great boxer Joe Louis and the tennis champion Althea Gibson. All three of them would advocate for access to golf clubs for black golfers and the dismantling of the color line in professional golf. Indeed, Gibson herself would go on to become the first black woman in the Ladies Professional Golf Association (LPGA). Robinson seemingly held black women golfers in particularly high esteem. They received considerable coverage in Our Sports under Robinson’s editorial eye, and he frequently mentioned various black women golfers in his columns. Perhaps this fondness is best seen in his frequent pairing with Gibson in golf tournaments in the 1950s and 1960s.

The Choi-Settes, a black women’s golf club in Chicago, hosted an annual golf tournament. Usually held at the Pipes-o-Peace golf course in Chicago, their tournaments were corporate-sponsored popular affairs that featured men’s and women’s competitions and the infamous celebrity showdown. For years the celebrity exhibition pitted Joe Louis and local golf superstar Ann Gregory against Robinson and Gibson. In subsequent years, the latter pair would take on a variety of challengers, including teen golf champions in 1963.12 Their games were fun to watch and drew lots of onlookers and supporters. In many ways the Robinson-Gibson pairing was fitting—after all, she spent much of her career being labeled the “female Jackie Robinson.”

As Gibson rose to prominence in the upper-class, lily-white, country club sport of tennis, it did not take long for the black press to hail her as Robinson’s feminine counterpart. When Gibson won Wimbledon in 1957, many headlines instantly invoked Robinson while applauding her feat. The Philadelphia Tribune proclaimed that “Althea Gibson Makes History; Joins Jackie as Trailblazer.”13 While Gibson sometimes bristled at this comparison and the expectations it placed on her, it is helpful to consider the ways in which the label of “female Jackie Robinson” has been used to further his legacy.

The use of Robinson’s name to describe barrier breakers is certainly not novel. Indeed, the first public mention of a “female Jackie Robinson” was almost immediately after his debut in 1947. A group of women from the American Girls Softball League penned a letter highlighting the achievements of their black teammate, Yvonne Coker. After extolling her phenomenal play in their league for the last three years, they mention that she is known in ballparks in the Northeast as “Jackie Robinson.” The women add that “this is all well and good, but we prefer her own name—after all didn’t she make the league first!”14 The Robinson moniker was conferred on Coker, as it was on Gibson, as a black woman breaking the color line in white sports. For decades this was the most common application of the phrase “the female Jackie Robinson.” It positioned athletes, such as Coker and Gibson, as contemporaries of Robinson, as barrier breakers replicating his achievements on parallel paths, not necessarily carrying on his legacy. Yet in the years following Robinson’s death, the phrase would widen, extending beyond black women and directly situating athletes as the continuation of his legacy.

Trailblazers

In the months before Robinson’s death, the Educational Amendment of 1972 was passed. The amendment included Title IX, a thirty-seven-word statement that would have wide-reaching effects and transform sports for girls and women in the United States. Title IX prohibits discrimination on the basis of sex for any federally funded educational program or activity. While athletics wasn’t the central concern of the legislators who drafted this act, it would quickly become clear that the act would radically alter competitive sporting opportunities in youth sports, high schools, and colleges. Title IX ushered in a sporting revolution of sorts. Robinson would not live to see it.

In the week before his death, Robinson spoke candidly about the work that Major League Baseball still had to do to diversify. He spoke of his desire to see black managers and third base coaches. Not surprisingly he mentioned nothing about getting women involved in the game. However, a few years later, Hank Aaron would invoke his legacy as he advocated for women in baseball. “Why shouldn’t women play professional major league baseball on the same team as men?,” Aaron asked. “Women are capable of playing. And it’s going to happen soon.”15 Aaron went on to explain that he was empathetic because of the discrimination he faced as a black man in the sport. “Everyone should be given a chance,” he added. Aaron cited Robinson as the person who opened his eyes to the possibilities of playing in the majors as a way to point out that it takes only one person to break down the barrier and usher in new talent to the game. In many ways, Aaron was issuing a call for the next “female Jackie Robinson.”

Unlike other calls or pronouncements of Robinson’s female counterparts, Aaron’s had rhetorically positioned a woman breaking into a men’s professional league as an heir to Robinson’s legacy as well. In the following decades, this implicit positioning would become an explicit and expressed view of Major League Baseball itself.

“Robinson’s Legacy Reaches the Front Office,” proclaimed a New York Times article from 1990. The article profiled a young black woman named Elaine Weddington, who was a scholarship recipient of the Jackie Robinson Foundation, which Rachel had founded in the year after Jack’s death. Weddington had used the foundation’s support to launch herself into a sports management career. She had just accepted a job as an assistant general manager with the Boston Red Sox. In many ways, Weddington embodied the vision of a diverse league from top to bottom that Robinson had articulated before his death.

In 1997, MLB hired Sharon Robinson, Jack and Rachel’s daughter, to be the director of educational programming. She was to focus on “urban and women’s issues” and pursue ideals championed by her father decades before.16 Under Sharon’s leadership, among other things, MLB has developed programs to market and grow the game of baseball and provide opportunities for unrepresented groups to get in the game as athletes, managers, and executives. This commitment to diversity and inclusion has expanded over the years to include a specific aim at supporting girls and women in baseball. Similar to Hank Aaron’s call for the next “female Jackie Robinson,” the educational programming from MLB seeks to incorporate girls and women athletes into the ideals and legacy of Jack Robinson. These programmatic initiatives expanded under Commissioner Bud Selig and continue today, including the Trailblazer Girls Baseball tournament held on Jackie Robinson Day each spring.

But the Trailblazer tournament remains overwhelmingly white. Mo’ne Davis aside, black girls are not participating in baseball at the same rates as their white peers. Moreover, the programming efforts that target black boys and (unintentionally) white girls to grow the game overlook and fail to reach black girls. Despite Robinson’s documented respect for black women athletes and the long history of black women’s baseball participation, the current demographics of the game—from the field to the front office—have yet to truly reflect the legacy of Jack Robinson’s commitment to and amplification of black girls and women in the sport.

Robinson was outspoken about many things, but he certainly was not a leading voice on women’s liberation. He had his own personal journey, fueled by his marriage to Rachel Robinson, with women’s equality and evolving gender norms. Yet it’s clear that throughout his life Robinson held space for black women in sports. It is important to note that his support was specifically for black girls and women. It was due to an immense respect for black women and their capabilities. Robinson respected, valued, celebrated, and amplified black women athletes when many did not. His legacy on women in sports could appropriately be considered Rachel’s legacy. For it was Rachel Robinson who influenced and pushed her husband to evolve his gender ideals. It was Rachel Robinson who sustained his legacy and institutionalized it through the foundation. It was Rachel and Sharon who pushed MLB for the expansion of inclusion and outreach programs to marginalized populations, insisting they live up to the legacy of Jackie Robinson they were so eager to champion. The encouragement and advice Jack Robinson gave to young Wilma Rudolph in 1955 rings true to other black women in sports today. Don’t give up, don’t let others discourage you, and keep going.