Source: The Players’ Tribune
In honor of National Girls & Women In Sports Day as well as Black History Month, here is a short list that is inclusive of all women who paved the way for those women who are still paving the way for our future.
1875 – Wellesley College opened with a gymnasium for exercising and a lake for ice skating and the first rowing program for women.
1876 – Nell Saunders defeated Rose Harland in the first United States women’s boxing match, receiving a silver butter dish as her prize.
1882 – At the YWCA in Boston, the first athletic games for women were held.
1887 – Ellen Hansell was crowned the first Women’s Singles tennis champion at the U.S. Open.
1898 – Lizzie Arlington became the first woman to sign a professional baseball contract, appearing in her first professional game pitching for the Philadelphia Reserves.
1941 – The first women’s intercollegiate lacrosse game was held between Sweet Briar College and The College of William and Mary in 1941.
1953 – Toni Stone, also known by her married name Marcenia Lyle Alberga, was the first of three women to play Negro Baseball League, and thus the first woman to play as a regular on an American big-league professional baseball team.
1971 – Cheryl White, an American, became the first black female jockey.
1996 – The WNBA was founded.
1999 – The WPFL was formed.
2007 – The CWHL was founded with the NWHL formed 8 years later in 2015.