There's No Crying in Baseball

WRITTEN BY GRACE MORCOS-HILL

ILLUSTRATION BY TULASI NAPOLITANI

I recently heard that the Women’s Pro Baseball League season is starting in the summer of 2026 and I was so excited. As someone who played softball in their youth, but never really liked Major League Baseball, a Woman’s league sounded amazing. This got me questioning why it has taken such a long time for a female baseball league to emerge. That’s when I remembered Penny Marshall’s 1992 film, A League of Their Own. The film follows Dottie Hinson, played by Geena Davis, as her sister and her join the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League in 1943 during World War II. The film stars Geena Davis, Lori Petty, Madonna, Rosie O’Donald, and Tom Hanks, an iconic and powerful cast of media legends of the 90’s. A League of Their Own is a quintessential female empowerment film that explores the dynamics of gender, power, and identity within the realm of baseball. If you haven’t seen it, I recommend adding it to your list. The thing that sticks out the most about the film is that it depicts a fictionalized account of the real life phenomenon of the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League (AAGPBL) which lasted from 1943-1954. The AAGPBL not only provided women with unprecedented opportunities in professional sports during the 1940s and 1950s, but also played a crucial role in reshaping societal perceptions of femininity and athleticism, ultimately laying the groundwork for future advancements in women’s sports.

The All-American Girls Professional Baseball League was created when Philip K. Wrigley was threatened with the cancellation of the Major League Baseball season due to players going off to fight in World War II, as stated in Laura J. Kenow’s paper, “The All-American Professional Baseball League (AAGPBL): A Review of Literature and Its Reflection of Gender Issues.” After this decision to make this new league, Wrigley and others tried to redefine the rules of this game as the only female counterpart sport to baseball was softball, so the league played a hybrid of the two sports. They began to scout women from across the US and Canada, and made final selections based on sliding, throwing, batting, etc. The women who were chosen for the four teams that were created – Racine Belles, South Bend Blue Sox, Kenosha Comets, and Rockford Peaches – were paid around $70 a week and were required to have no other job during the baseball season. The players were also required to attend Rubenstein’s Beauty Salon’s evening charm classes as Kenow states in her paper, “Wrigley and Meyerhoff’s beliefs that the success of the AAGPBL depended upon marketing the players’ femininity as much as their athletic skill.” It was mandatory for each player to be hygienic and focus on their physical beauty. A special uniform was created for the league, consisting of knee high socks, a cap, and a short dress, which was used in order to highlight the player’s femininity and appeal to the male gaze. The league became very popular after its first well-played season, as stated on The All-American Girls Professional Baseball League’s website, “Most of the nation was involved… in the war effort. Women, who were formerly homemakers, left their homes to support the war by taking jobs in factories…This change in the traditional occupation of women made the environment much friendlier for accepting women as professional ball players.” Since the US and the world were going through a devastating war, there were many societal changes happening on the homefront. While husbands were away, Rosie the Riveter came out to play, and women got to leave behind the homemaking for the breadwinning. These changes led to a more understanding and accepting crowd for the AAGPBL. The league expanded after its first season and even continued some time after the war had ended and Major League Baseball had picked up again. The league unfortunately was dismantled in 1954 as the sport had lost its popularity. Over 600 women played throughout the league’s 12 year run, and it gave many women the ability to play a sport at a professional level that had a huge and supportive fan base. This whole phenomena challenged and reshaped the notion of femininity and what it meant to be a woman, and also helped pave the road for future women in sports and beyond.

Prior to this time, women were confined to being homemakers and ladylike, and yet every single woman who participated in the league showcased that women were athletic and competitive. This league allowed them to show not only a culture that focused solely on their gender and the restrictions that come with that, but also how women can be strong, athletic, hardworking, and still feminine. These new adjectives to the word “woman” didn’t take away from femininity, but showcased the true power and facets that lie behind femininity. This league, though short run, had a lasting impact on not only female professional sports, but also female agency, as later down the road in 1972 Title IX was passed. Many women who played for the AAGPBL were on the front lines fighting for Title IX to be passed, which prohibited discrimination based on sex in educational settings. These women became role models for young girls who could see themselves becoming professional athletes as it gave them women to look up to. And though this is an important time in history for women, the league was forgotten for a time. This brings us back to Penny Marshall and her 1992 film A League of Their Own. This film brought back awareness of this interesting bubble of time in history, bringing back an interest in the phenomena of the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League. Though the story is fictional, it perfectly highlights the struggles that these women faced trying to get people to take the league seriously and showed the camaraderie and triumph that these women were able to accomplish in this short window of time. I cannot stress enough how much I adore this film and what it did for me as a young girl wanting to be a part of the Rockford Peaches. The AAGPBL is still inspiring over 80 years later, and I am so excited and will be tuning in for the inaugural game of the Women’s Pro Baseball League in 2026.