Neighborhood News: The Chicago Colleens were in “A League of Their Own”
While many are familiar with Penny Marshall’s iconic 1992 movie “A League of Their Own,” following the exploits of the Rockford Peaches of the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League, DID YOU KNOW…that Chicago had a team in the league?
The Chicago Colleenswere a women’s professional baseball team from 1948 to 1951, evolving into a development team. The team was based Chicago, Illinois and played their home games at Shewbridge Field, at the corner of South Morgan and West 74th Streets on the South Side of Chicago, now part of the campus of the Stagg School of Excellence.
History of the AAGPBL
According to Wikipedia sources, with the entry of the United States into World War II, several major league baseball executives started the AAGPL new professional league with women players to maintain baseball in the public eye while the majority of able men were away. The founders included Chicago Cubs owner, Philip K. Wrigley, Brooklyn Dodgers owner Branch Rickey and Chicago Cubs attorney Paul V. Harper. They feared baseball might cease due to the war because of the loss of talent and travel restrictions due to gas rationing.
Tryouts, as the movie showed, were held at Wrigley Field. Over 200 women were recruited from amateur softball games across the country. About 60 were selected for the league rosters for four teams, including the Kenosha Comets, Racine Belles, Rockford Peaches, and the South Bend Blue Sox. The first league game was played on May 30, 1943. Salaries were above average for women, ranging from $45–$85 ($792–$1497 in 2023 dollars) a week during the first years of play to about $125 ($1467 in 2023 dollars) per week in later years. The women’s league generally mirrored the men’s late spring-early autumn season.
As the movie depicted, the women wore sleeved tunic dresses and shorts, with a slight flare of the skirt. Rules stated that skirts were to be worn no more than six inches above the knee, but the regulation was often ignored in order to facilitate running and fielding. During spring training, the girls were required to attend evening classes at Helena Rubinstein’s charm school. Over 600 women played in the league, which eventually consisted of 10 teams located in the American Midwest. In 1948, league attendance peaked at 910,000 spectators over 10 teams. The league folded in 1954, after 12 seasons.
Chicago Colleens a late entry
It’s surprising to me that, despite having Wrigley as a founder of the AAGPBL, no team from Chicago existed until 1948.
As Wikipedia sources tell it, the Colleens joined the strong Eastern Division in the 1948 season and were managed by former Major League player Dave Bancroft. The team was the worst in the league, getting roughed up as a last-place expansion club with a 47–76 record, ending 29.5 games out of the first place spot in the division.
The only team to do worse, the Springfield Sallies of the Western Division, ended 41–84 in last place, 35.5 games out of 1st place.
At the end of the season, the Colleens were not showing a profit and were losing fans, according to the official AAGPBL history. For the next two years, the Colleens and Sallies became rookie training teams that played exhibition games and recruited new talent as they toured through the South and East. Highlights of these tours included contests in Washington, D.C.’s Griffith Park and New York’s Yankee Stadium.
However, the rise of television and the postwar economic boom gave rise to new activities, which spelled the end of the AAGBPL. For the Colleens, as revenues fell, individual teams were no longer able to support rookie training teams like the Colleens and Sallies.
After the 1954 season, the league disbanded. Sixty-five original AAGPBL members appeared in scenes filmed in October 1991, recreating the induction of the league into the Baseball Hall of Fame in 1988, later to be immortalized in “A League of Their Own.”
Alison Moran-Powers and Dean’s Team Chicago
