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WOMEN'S SPORT HISTORY

MISSING: WOMEN FROM SPORTS HALLS OF FAME

by Bruce Kidd
Published in CAAWS Action Bulletin, Winter 1995

There are only 48 women (13 per cent) among the 377 athletes and builders celebrated in Canada's Sports Hall of Fame, and only 56 women (21 per cent) among the 247 recognized in the Canadian Olympic Hall of Fame.

Despite the fact that women have excelled in ice hockey for more than a century, there are no women at all among the honoured members in the Hockey Hall of Fame. As Allison Griffiths of the CBC's Inside Track has pointed out, the profligate James and Bruce Norris, who virtually destroyed strong franchises in Chicago and Detroit, are included in the Hockey Hall, while their innovative sister Marguerite, who presided over the Red Wings during five profitable seasons and three Stanley Cups, has been ignored.

Halls of Fame play a strategic role in the public remembering and interpretation of sports. Through their annual, often well-publicized selections and inductions, they confer status (and lifetime bragging rights) upon those selected, singling out in the process particular sports, skills, practices, and values for praise or blame, legitimation or derision.

Thousands visit the new high-tech Hockey Hall in Toronto's commercial core. Other halls have become important sources of reference for school children, journalists, and amateur and professional historians. To the extent that their selection decisions shape the records they maintain — the excellent archives of Canada's Sports Hall of Fame in Toronto only actively collects materials on inducted members, for example — their judgments shape the primary data available for research.

Can you imagine what Canadian sports would be like today without the contributions of Abby Hoffman, Marion Lay, Betty Baxter, and Diane Jones Konihowski, all inspirational Olympians who have significantly improved the opportunities for many others? It would be impossible to write about the "Golden Age of Women's Sport" in the 1920s without an entire chapter on Alexandrine Gibb, who single-handedly initiated Canadians women's participation in international competition, created the Women's Amateur Athletic Federation, and wrote about women's activities in her daily column in the Toronto Star. Yet none of these women, and many others I could mention, are included in Canada's Sports Hall of Fame, which aspires to be the most inclusive and comprehensive of the Canadian halls, or the Olympic Hall of Fame, administered by the Canadian Olympic Association.

The dearth of women in so many halls and exhibits is hardly innocent. It contributes to the 'symbolic annihilation' of women throughout the public discourse. In the case of the displays in athletic facilities, it may well send out the message that the efforts of girls and women are unworthy. That was certainly the conclusion arrived at by the Gender Equity Task Force at the University of Toronto last year.

Some halls base selection on high performance, but that should hardly be a problem. As University of British Columbia sports historian Barbara Schrodt has often pointed out, when the number of events and size of teams are considered, Canadian women have usually outperformed Canadian men in international competition. An even more pressing case can be made in response to the ambition of many institutions to provide 'popular ethnographies' of the history of sport. The Alberta and Manitoba halls even include the word, 'museum', in their titles. Given the rich history of girls and women competing in sports, it is simply inaccurate not to include them.

One explanation might be the predominance of male broadcasters and sportswriters on selection committees. What counts as 'sports' on most broadcasts and newspapers is male professional sports. There are only two women — Jones-Konihowski and Susan Nattrass — among 13 selectors at Canada's Sports Hall of Fame. But individual selections are also structured by a pervasive undervaluing of women's contribution throughout Canadian society.

In the past, it's primarily been feminists who have initiated the recognition of Canadian female athletes. In the 1930s, when the now familiar traditions of 'athletes of the year', all-star games and halls of fame were invented, the Women's Amateur Athletic Union of Canada created the Velma Springstead Trophy to honour the best female athlete of the year. In our own time, CAAWS inaugurated the moving annual Breakthrough Awards. Much more needs to be done, so it will have to be feminists (and their allies) who seize the reins again.

It would be nice to have a Women's Sports Hall of Fame in a well-travelled location in every Canadian city, but given the scarcity of resources, that is not likely to happen. We should step up the pressure on existing institutions.

Every hall of fame has its own selection criteria, process, and culture, so some legwork is necessary, but it shouldn't be too hard for members of the CAAWS Network to increase the number of well-researched applications each year, and to raise the eyebrows of funding agencies and sponsors if they get turned down.

It's also time to start pushing for gender parity on selection committees.

Another target should be the historical displays in those halls with facilities. Most curators are professionally trained and accept the obligation of 'getting it right'.

Perhaps the most accessible to the CAAWS Network are the historical displays in schools, college and university athletic departments where women make up a significant percentage (sometimes the majority) of the population. Do the displays adequately reflect the experiences and accomplishments of sportswomen, and serve to affirm their interest and abilities? If not, how might such displays be made more accurate and inclusive?

Although the recommendation of the U of T Gender Equity Task Force — to make a dent upon the long history of 'symbolic annihilation' with a year of women-only displays — was not accepted, just raising the above questions had an educational effect.

The full story needs to be told!

Bruce Kidd’s writing reveals his astonishing range of interests and knowledge of sport. Among his published works are articles dealing with physical activity, athletes' rights, the place of sport in the modern state, physical education for adults, sport and masculinity, and the philosophy of excellence. Almost single-handedly, he has brought attention to illustrious but largely forgotten contributors to Canada's rich sporting history such as the ground-breaking Women's Amateur Athletic Federation. His most recent work, The Struggle for Canadian Sport, won the North American Society for Sport History Book Award in 1997. During the 1960's, Bruce was Canada's best known middle-distance runner, winning the Lou Marsh Trophy for his successes on the track. He was twice chosen Canada's Male Athlete of the Year.