Babe Didrikson Greatest Female Athlete?

On March twentieth, nineteen thirty seven, the Babe, not that one. Babe Dickerson, possibly the greatest female athlete of all time, pitched an inning of exhibition ball for the Philadelphia Athletics versus the Brooklyn Dodgers. Here's a story behind this amazing athlete you may have never heard of and how she got to be on the pitchers mound versus the men. Welcome to Daily Sports History. I'm Ethan Reese, your guide to a rapid deep dive into sports history every day. Born Mildred Ella Dickerson, she actually got the nickname Babe because of how great an athlete she was growing up a part of seven children in Texas. Her parents were immigrants from Norway. Though she had great talents on the field, she also had talents off, competing in sewing and stream stress and competitions while growing up, which also led her to making her own uniforms for the sports she played. Now, what sports did she play? Basically all of them. She had accomplishments in basketball, track, golf, baseball, tennis, swimming, diving, boxing, volleyball, handball, bowling, billiards, skating, and cycling. Just saying that list is exhausting to me, but she wanted to be the greatest athlete who ever lived, and she started to gain notoriety on the track and field circuit as well as being an All American basketball player. Her first job out of high school was as a secretary for the employer's Casualty Insurance Company of Dallas, but she's not hired to be a secretary. She's actually hired to play for the company's basketball team, the Golden Cyclones, and to keep her amateurism. Employed by them and paid to be a secretary, but was really being paid to play basketball, and she was an All American basketball player. She led the team to the AAU the imateur Athletic Union Basketball Championship in nineteen thirty one, but Dickerson wanted to focus on track and field as the Olympics were coming up, and in nineteen thirty two at the AAU Championships in track and field, she competed in eight of the ten events offered, winning five outright and tying in another one. Dickerson's performance was so good she seen handily beat the next best team, which had twenty two athletes on it, and at the nineteen thirty two Olympics held in Los Angeles, California. She set four world records, winning two gold medals and one silver. But in nineteen thirty four is when she crossed the line and played a professional baseball exhibition game for the Philadelphia Athletics against the Brooklyn Dodgers. Now this was only for a springtreet training game. It was really more of a publicity stunt. They did get a great athlete and someone that had played baseball in her entire life, so she wasn't just a slouch on the field. But it wasn't a real tryout. It wasn't a chance to actually make the team. It was just to get fans to come watch the game. They didn't stop her from doing good, not allowing a hit and just walking one batter. But then in nineteen thirty five, she really took off in the game of golf, and this was a sport and she would mark her stamp forever. She had been playing in amateur tournaments for years, and then in January nineteen thirty eight, she actually competed at the Los Angeles Open, a PGA tournament event for men. No other woman had competed against men in tournaments until more recently with the Likes in a Storm Stamp and Michelle Whet about six decades after Babe Dickerson did it. She didn't go on to win the event, but just competing at that time was impressive, and she had a love for golf, and her love actually led her to her husband, who she met at that tournament, was paired with her and the two eventually got married eleven months later, and she would go on to compete in more PGA tournaments throughout her career here and there, and in nineteen forty five, she became the first woman to make it past the first cut in a PGA tournament event, and she played a pivotal role in starting the LPGA, which she dominated in the early years, including winning the first Women's US Open, the first World Champion, and All American Open. But unfortunately, shortly after the LPGA started, she got diagnosed with cancer that had spread to her lip notes and became inoperable, but they didn't stop her from competing for the the next couple of years until nineteen fifty five, when the pain from the cancer became unbearable. She went on to pass away in nineteen fifty six at the age of forty five, but she left a legacy in golf that can still be seen to this day, as there's still awards the tournaments named after her. She finished her athletic career with four world records, two gold medals in a silver, eleven PGA Tour victories, making the World Golf Hall of Fame in nineteen seventy four, being the Athlete of the Year six times from nineteen thirty two to nineteen fifty four, and posthumously was given the Presidential Medal of Freedom in twenty twenty one. You may have not heard her name before, but she truly was one of the greatest athletes of all time. Thank you for listening to the day's daily sports history. If you like this, please join our community on social media. We got Twitter, Instagram, Facebook, TikTok, YouTube, Pinterest, wherever you like to socialize online. We're there to help join you and have fun along the way. And come back tomorrow for more daily sports history.