How Did Women’s Sports Teams Get Their Start?
In 1922, Sybil Bauer, a student at Northwestern University, swam the 440-yard backstroke in just under 6 minutes and 25 seconds, beating the record held by a man and shattering notions of women’s athletic abilities.
The achievement inspired Ethelda Bleibtrey, another swimmer, to warn men that a challenge had been issued on “behalf of all womankind against the supremacy of man in the world of sports.” “Eventually,” she wrote in a 1923 magazine article, “women will win as many of these prizes as men.” Ms.
Bauer, who was 19 when she smashed the record, set nearly two dozen swimming records and won the gold medal in the women’s backstroke at the 1924 Olympics, before dying of cancer at 23.
As for Ms. Bleibtrey’s prediction, it would take nearly five decades for many women to get the kinds of opportunities that men had to compete for championship laurels.
