Tualatin Academy Women's Basketball Photograph

Title

Tualatin Academy Women's Basketball Photograph

Description

The photograph includes the Tualatin Academy women's basketball team of 1909. The girls pictured from left to right include: Lila McDonald, Ada Wiest, Beulah Ireland, Grace Thomas, Helen Allworth, and Florence Avery. These girls were a combination of students from the Tualatin Academy and Pacific University. The team combined both high school and college women because of the lack of enrollment of women in the school during that time.
The women's basketball team only could compete inter-class games instead of teams from other schools. Women would compete against one another based on their year they were in school such as 2nd year team versus a 3rd year team. There were at least 2 women's basketball teams during 1909, but that was because they did not travel to compete against other team. There was not much support of women's athletics yet to compete competitively against other schools and teams unlike the men. Men had much more opportunities even in 1909 to compete not just their own class, but other teams from other cities such as McMinnville.

The photograph is significant because women's basketball became popular in the United States around 1892, and was offered here at Pacific University as early as the 1900's. Even though women did not have the same opportunities as men in basketball, they were still able to participate. Women were at least given an opportunity to play sports at Pacific University. There are many inequalities about how women were treated unfairly in athletics, but it shows the progress of women being recognized in documents of their participation in sports.


Identifier

PUApic_009179

Rights

Copyright Not Evaluated
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Type

Still Image