| If you are a die hard fan of the game of baseball | | | | answer, she's the 96 year old great |
| then you will want to keep reading. Baseball is not | | | | grand-daughter of Dale Gear; the only woman to |
| all about the salaries, the championships, the | | | | have ever played major league professional |
| endorsements, and the fan fare. It is also a sport | | | | baseball! Your eyes are not deceiving you at this |
| that is deeply rooted in a substantial amount of | | | | moment; I did write that she was the first and |
| world history. Yes, I said world history. Many | | | | only female have ever play major league baseball. |
| historical events transpired many decades ago | | | | Dale Dudley Gear played for the Washington |
| within the game of baseball, which helped to | | | | Senators in 1901 as an outfielder and pitcher in |
| shape the civil rights landscape of the United | | | | their very first year of the American League and |
| States of America. | | | | it was also the very first and only season for |
| In 1901 women in the United States were still on | | | | Dale Gear. The manager of the team at that time |
| the long and hard road to achieving their civil | | | | was Mr. Jimmy Manning; he had convinced Dale |
| rights under the law. In 1903 the Women's | | | | Gear to promise that she would not disclose her |
| National Trade Union League was created in order | | | | true identity to anyone, so this remained an open |
| to advocate for better wages and working | | | | family secret in the Gear household for decades. |
| conditions for women. In the midst of all this | | | | Imagine the implications that could have arisen |
| struggle and progress there laid a secret story | | | | from the news that a woman was playing along |
| that was taking place in the game of baseball that | | | | side men of that day. As I had mentioned |
| no one was aware of, a secret so soundly kept | | | | previously, women had just begun to achieve |
| that it actually lay dormant for 100 years until the | | | | very minimal levels of equality within society, a |
| silence was finally broken by a lady named | | | | women playing baseball of all things would have |
| Winifred Gear Swanson. You may be wondering | | | | been completely unheard of, and as it stands in |
| who Winifred Gear Swanson is and that would be | | | | today's society it still is. |
| a good question to ask. So here is the good | | | | |