The Arizona Republic

Women’s softball was the bee’s knees in ’50s Phoenix

- The Best of Clay Thompson Arizona Republic USA TODAY NETWORK

Did you know Phoenix was, for a while, the unofficial softball capital of the United States?

The sport was wildly popular here in the 1930s, ’40s and ’50s. Thousands of fans turned out to cheer such teams as the A-1 Queens and the Holsum Maids and superstars including Dot Wilkinson and Billie Harris.

Two Phoenix teams, the Ramblers and the Queens, brought home five national championsh­ips between them in the 1940s.

During the Depression, low admission prices made the game inexpensiv­e entertainm­ent. During World War II years, men’s profession­al baseball stuttered as many of its best players went off to fight.

The softball business was not all fun and games. Players endured, among other things, grueling travel schedules and sexism. Women of color faced racism. The women played in shorts or skirts and were required to appear welldresse­d and feminine in public. Lipstick was worn at all times. No bobs, only fashionabl­e haircuts, were permitted.

Players were forbidden to appear in the stands in their uniforms. Shorts and slacks were not allowed in public.

There was no smoking or drinking, and public appearance­s were chaperoned. Players had to ask a chaperone for permission to go on a date. No obscenitie­s were to be uttered at any time.

Despite the hardships on the road, the bumps and bruises on the field and the rules that now seem sexist or quaint, young women flocked to try out. Wilkinson, a catcher and Phoenix native, joined the Ramblers as a bat girl at age 11, started playing when she was 15 and played into her 40s. She won 19 All-America awards.

Another notable player was Rose Perica, who left her hometown of Globe in 1939 to join the Queens. She played one season before moving on to a career in state government. You may know her as Rose Mofford, Arizona’s first female governor, who served from 1988-91.

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