The start of the 2025 @mlb season is less than a week away, let’s not forget that baseball’s foundation was shaped by more than just the names in Cooperstown. The impact of Black women in baseball runs deep, and today’s pros stand on their shoulders—whether they realize it or not.  

The very first team at any level to be paid to play baseball was an all-female African American team, the Philadelphia Dolly Vardens—two years before the Cincinnati Red Stockings. The Dolly Vardens were among many Bloomer Girls teams. Beginning in the late 19th century, these teams were composed of women and played baseball on college campuses, in industrial leagues, through local community groups, and on barnstorming teams. They had no home field and often traveled by train to small towns across the Midwest and western states.  At a time when Black women were expected to work as domestic laborers, they stepped onto the diamond instead, breaking barriers long before the sport even acknowledged them.

#WomensHistoryMonth #WomenInBaseball

Billie Harris` interest in softball was sparked after moving to Tucson, Arizona, where she stumbled across an article in the local magazine *Arizona Highways*.

“I used to throw the ball up against the wall. I actually did that for hours on end.”

Harris ended up playing for The Ramblers, the same team she read about as a teen. Her path was far from easy, as she faced obstacles due to her race and sex. However, she had been raised to be resilient as the only girl in a house with four boys.

In 1954, after being forced to miss the national championships due to the threat of racial violence, she reflected, “I never let much of the segregation bother me. It was tough, but I would go through whatever it took to play.”

After collecting 264 hits, 123 runs, 59 RBIs, 70 no-hitters, and four perfect games over 370 games and six decades, the left-handed pitcher retired at the age of 74, remarking in a 2022 interview with *Essence*:

“I would have continued except I had knee problems,” she says. “I just thought I’d better quit then.”

In 1982, she became the first African-American woman inducted into the USA Softball National Softball Hall of Fame.

#WomensHistoryMonth #Trailblazer