If you are a die-hard fan of the game of baseball, you will want to read on. Baseball isn’t just about salaries, championships, endorsements and fan fees. It is also a sport that is deeply embedded in a substantial part of world history. Yes, I said world history. Many historical events occurred many decades ago within the game of baseball, which helped shape the civil rights landscape of the United States of America.
In 1901, women in the United States were still on the long and hard road to achieve their civil rights under the law. In 1903, the National League of Women’s Trade Unions was created to advocate for better wages and working conditions for women. In the midst of all this struggle and progress lay a secret story going on in the game of baseball that no one was aware of, a secret so deeply guarded that it actually lay dormant for 100 years until the silence was finally broken by a lady named Winifred Gear Swanson. You may be wondering who Winifred Gear Swanson is and that would be a good question to ask. So here’s the good answer, she is the 96 year old great-granddaughter of Dale Gear; the only woman to have played professional baseball in the major leagues! Your eyes are not deceiving you right now; I wrote that she was the first and only woman to play in Major League Baseball.
Dale Dudley Gear played for the Washington Senators in 1901 as an outfielder and pitcher in his first year in the American League and it was also the first and only season for Dale Gear. The team’s manager at the time was Mr. Jimmy Manning; he had convinced Dale Gear to promise him that he would not reveal his true identity to anyone, so this remained an open family secret in the Gear household for decades. Imagine the implications that could have arisen from the news that a woman was playing alongside the men that day. As I mentioned earlier, women had only just begun to reach minimal levels of equality within society, a woman playing baseball of all things would have been completely unheard of, and as she is in today’s society, she still is.
In fact, the Encyclopedia of Baseball lists Dale Gear as an active player for the Washington Senators in 1901 as an outfielder and pitcher who hit .232 as an outfielder and had a 4-11 record and a 4.03 era as a pitcher. Although the Encyclopedia lists Gear, there is no mention of his gender, only a middle name that alludes to him being male. Winifred Gear Swanson states that it is true that Dudley was his middle name, but it was the “family” surname, so it was not uncommon for women in his family to bear it.
Mrs. Swanson has plenty of evidence to substantiate her claim that, in fact, her great-grandmother was Dale Gear, the baseball player. She was able to produce a birth certificate that indicates her name and in the section marked as gender, she is indicated as a girl. She also has some very important and valuable memories. A signed Senators team photo displaying the inscription “Our Dale, the best female baseball player in the country,” and if that’s not enough, Ms. Swanson also produced an autographed baseball with Dale Gear’s signature . This ball and other memorabilia were to be auctioned off to raise funds to build a Women’s Baseball Museum in Lone Elm, the town Dale lived in, and we can all guess who the first member will be. Ms. Swanson felt it was time to share this tremendous story with the rest of the world, and I appreciate it. It’s an important piece of history, and a source of inspiration to start with. There is so much that women can achieve in today’s society, whether in sports or any other activity, and we are fortunate to have these treasured stories and bits of history to remind us that the impossible is more possible than we can imagine. with perseverance and passion.
Barry Halper, a well-known sports memorabilia collector, managed to obtain a used Dale Gear uniform, which had a giant W on the front and no actual number. When asked why he bought this instead of the HOF uniforms that he is known to collect, the reason for him was simple, it belonged to a woman. How did he know? He found a game-worn bra inside the uniform, the only bra worn in a major league professional game, that’s a bra he wouldn’t burn in the name of progress. Looking back at the photos of Dale Gear, I have to honestly say she was the most beautiful pitcher/outfielder I have ever seen. As a sports fan and collector of sports memorabilia and trading cards, I can appreciate this story on many levels. As a woman, this story has an even bigger picture, one that should serve to inspire and empower all women to set their goals and there are no limits, anything can be possible if you try, even if you’re just a girl.