A Little Herstory and a Little Basketball History
From Time to Thyme
By Paula Dunn
It’s finally spring! I know that, not because the calendar says so, but because Gatewood’s Vegetable Farm is open again. (They’re more dependable than the robins.)
It’s time for a little spring cleaning of reader feedback.
Lisa Hayner responded to the column about obstacles females used to face, saying that the company that made the cars she and her mother, Jerry Snyder, drove in the 1980s apparently thought only men owned automobiles. Although the women had used their full names to buy their cars, letters and offers the company sent them both later came addressed to “Mr.” Snyder.
(I can see how the spelling of Jerry’s first name might have caused confusion, but who ever heard of a man named “Lisa?”)
That wasn’t Lisa’s only negative experience with a car company. Around 1999 or 2000, her husband accompanied her to a dealership when she went car shopping. Lisa said that each time she asked the car salesman a question, he ignored her and directed his answer to her husband.
(Lisa bought a car alright — from another dealership with a salesman who knew who his customer was!)
My college friend, Barry Shevitz, pointed out that males could be affected by gender stereotypes in the 1970s, too.
When Barry was In high school, he wanted to take a typing class so he’d know how to type papers for college courses. He was informed that he had to take a short class offered during the summer instead of the regular two-semester class because the regular class was just for girls. (It included secretarial skills!)
Both Lisa and Barry commented on differences in the way newspapers treated men and women in earlier times.
Lisa, who’s into genealogy, noticed that early obituaries for married women often refer to the deceased as “Mrs. So and So,” without ever mentioning the woman’s first name. In addition, the obits frequently describe the woman’s husband’s life rather than her life.
Barry recalled the Indianapolis Star’s classified ads in the ‘70s divided job postings into “employment — men” and “employment — women.”
(By the way, Barry lives in Israel now, so I can legitimately claim an international readership!)
Pam Ferber’s reminder that Noblesville High School had a girls’ swim team when she was a senior prompted me to dig out my old yearbooks to refresh my memory.
I need to make a correction — although it might be more accurate to say a clarification. There were indeed no girls’ athletic teams representing NHS my first two years of high school, but NHS did field some girls’ teams during my last two years.
More or less.
The first year for NHS girls’ swimming was 1971-1972. The NHS GAA basketball team also played a few games against nearby schools that year. The following year, NHS girls competed against other schools in track, swimming, basketball, tennis and gymnastics.
Those girls’ teams were NOTHING like post-Title IX teams, however. Their main competition wasn’t other schools; it was the boys teams. The boys’ needs ALWAYS came first. The girls had to fit their practices and games into times the boys weren’t using the school’s facilities. There was no money for girls’ uniforms, let alone separate facilities.
Pam also brought up how seats at the sectional basketball tournaments were in such high demand when we were in school that drawings had to be held to determine who could buy tickets.
Larry Cloud remembered the 1961 sectional snowstorm well. He said he and his girlfriend managed to catch a ride home through the snow with a Westfield High School teacher and his wife “in their heavy 1957 Oldsmobile.”
They made it back to Westfield, but Larry ended up spending the night on the living room sofa at his girlfriend’s house. The next day he trudged a mile and a half through the snow to his own home.
Paula Dunn’s From Time to Thyme column appears on Wednesdays in The Times. Contact her at younggardenerfriend@gmail.com