First Ophelia had the photograph, now she’s got the video: Katherine Switzer on being the first woman to run the Boston Marathon. It’s kind of shocking to see just how backward people were back in 1967, with the race organizer screaming at her and trying to drag her out of the race, and the journalists querulously asking her if she was a “crusader” or a “suffragette”…because she was a woman running in a race.
Fifteen years later, I’d be at the University of Oregon in Eugene (also known as Tracktown USA), and it was taken as a matter of course that women would be competing in races, and I can’t even imagine anyone questioning their ability to run.
Sometimes it’s good to look back and see things that really have changed for the better.
Even more importantly, no penises fell off.
Not even from the guys she finished ahead of.
PBS recently ran an excellent documentary on ground breaking women called Makers.
One of the episodes showed the footage of Katherine Switzer running as the organizer tried to pull her from a group of runners. He looks extremely foolish in light of the strides women have made since then.
Horray for progress and Katherine Switzer!
PZ:
Women’s lib was starting to seriously grow in ’67, and there was already a backlash at that time, from women invading the workplace, no longer content to stay knocked up and hidden in the kitchen.
Mad Men may not be that far off in their depiction of the 1960s.
Went to the link and watched.
This is a clip from the PBS program Makers which I highly recommend.
Milestones in the history of women running (my bolding).
So fragile. Right.
As Rob Grigjanis points out, even the “first” ones are following trail blazers. Even in the Boston Marathon, JenBPhillips notes in the first comment of the Ophelia’s first post, Roberta Gibb’s race entry was denied on the grounds of being female, so she ran the race anyway. In 1967, she ran it again, and was blocked from finishing just before the line.
It doesn’t take away from Switzer being the first woman to officially run the race to tell the stories of others who were also trailblazers. It is important to realise that progress can be marked by the actions of individual milestones, but those milestones don’t happen in isolation by the action of individual heros alone.
I remember watching Joan Benoit win the first Women’s Marathon at the Summer Olympics 1984 on television: Outstanding run, glorious, finished hundreds of meters and almost two minutes ahead of the next in an incredible field of runners, including the magnificent Rosa Mota from Portugal. Benoit had five 1st place finishes in other major marathons, and even finished 6th in the New York Marathon as late as 1991 (she was born in 1957).
Run like a woman? Hell yes. Hell. Fucking. Yes.
One of the great joys for me in the race events I’ve run (which are nowhere near the same level of professionalism or athleticism as a marathon, to be sure) is seeing the great diversity of runners. 20,000 participants around me, all different body shapes, sizes, gender identities, melanin expressions, sexual identities, ages, runners with prostheses, runners in wheelchairs, blind runners, deaf runners, runners with dogs, runners pushing strollers (inevitably passing me. I haz a slow).
It makes the run better.
All those years of athletic events, and all those athletic event cultures who didn’t realize how poor their event was, because they didn’t realize how poor their exclusivity and bigotry was. Sexism still poisons, and there is still so much work to do, but it’s a joy to see examples of it getting left in the dust as brilliant lives Doppler bigotry into ignominy.
Dang, now I really want to go for a run. I’ll see you all later. Time to go kick some asphalt!
Still learning, still running,
Robert
Personally, I think anyone who has their reproductive organs flopping around externally, and weak spots in the abdominal wall where they wormed their way out, should be prohibited from running lest they hurt themselves, or worse yet, endanger their future BAAAABEEEEZ!!!!
Or maybe I just want an excuse to be sedentary….
@echidna, glad you mentioned Bobby Gibb. She was our landlord from 1998 to 2006. A truly amazing person. Bobby still runs and you will toss your cookies trying to keep up. She was a corporate lawyer (another glass ceiling) and is now retired and has taken up sculpting.
I think that picture perfectly captures the attitude that women have faced when entering any male dominated field,from voting to any sort of ‘unfeminine’ education or career and are still facing in certain science careers,gaming,geek culture,skeptism and just generally having an opinion on the internet.**
** I could go on with the list but it would take me all night.
The Count:
I’ve been really impressed by what I’ve read about her. She seems amazing.
Bobby Gibb is now considered the female winner of the Boston Marathon “unsanctioned” era for 1966 through 1968, according to the Boston Marathon site. Reportedly Gibb was refused entry into a med program on gender grounds. Hence she did law.
I think there is another good story in Jock Semple. He was apparently known for tackling athletes that didn’t fit the image of an athlete – i.e. he seemed to have it in for university types. However, his normal tactic of manhandling “outsiders” was not considered a normal way to handle a woman, i.e. Switzer. It’s an example of how changing the race to become more inclusive made life better for everyone.
I saw this dynamic time and time again in the work place, when I was the first female engineer to work in various environments. The normal rough treatment given out to newcomers was modified because it was glaringly apparent that the normal “tests” were not appropriate for a woman. Of course, they weren’t appropriate for anybody. The natural result was that it changed the rules for male newcomers as well. Win-win all round. From what I can gather, Jock Semple was keen to enforce social norms. When the norms changed, he reportedly changed his behaviour and supported the new norms. I think the story of changing social dynamics is an important one.
Heck it looked to me that she could have knocked him on his ass. I know at the time it would have been very un-lady like! I was born in 1956 and have witnessed the changes but we still aren’t there yet.
How do I get a video of Ophelia deleting my comments because she doesn’t like me persistently disagreeing with her islamophobic arguments?
exi5tentialist
Why? Do you want it for a trophy to show your slymy friends?
What’s wrong with having your comments deleted? Oh, wait, I forgot. You and your slymy friends don’t understand free speech.
exi5tentialist is a silly person who likes to pretend that it’s automagically racist to criticise islam. Maybe they should read a little. I think exi5tentialist is racist for apparently insisting that only the misogynist authoritarians are “allowed” to speak for all muslims and for all people in predominantly muslim communities.
http://aveilandadarkplace.com/2014/04/16/the-racism-of-the-white-wolf-who-cried-islamophobia/
Monitor note
Any further discussion of Islamophobia or Ophelia’s deletion of comments is off topic here and should be taken to Thunderdome.
Look at those genetic differences keeping women out of the race; definitely not an example of a societal barrier, amirite slymepitters / MRAs?
Desert Son:
I, too, remember Joan Benoit’s gold medal run in the LA Olympics. I also, very clearly, remember the commentators, two men (of course), wondering whether she would be able to complete the race. At about mile 14 or 15, somewhere near the middle of the race, she put on a burst of speed and quickly opened up about a 4 or 5 minute lead. And the announcers thought that she had made an incredible mistake — no way was she going to have the muscles and energy left to keep ahead of the pack for the remainder of the race. She did and it was great. She entered the stadium for the last part of the race — just under one lap on the track, and there she was. One runner. Totally alone on the track. With tens of thousands of spectators watching. And many of the them didn’t even realize that she was the leader in the marathon — she was so far ahead of the expected time for the women’s race that even the PA announcers in the stadium missed what was going on. One of my favourite memories from any Olympics.
Thanks for the memories, PZ and Desert Son. And thanks, PZ, for the reminder of how far we have come.
It’s kind of amazing. Although to add to what echidna says, there’s a picture of her hugging him at the ’73 Boston Marathon when the ban was lifted. I don’t know, of course, but the apparent duplicity in avoiding the conventional rules probably annoyed him as much as anything else.
If you ever want to see autocratic, bureaucratic, dogmatic authoritarian people, bordering on insanity, in ‘the wild’ head to your local amateur sporting organisation. Any sport will do. You’ll find a couple.
That or local government.
Katherine Switzer is an inspiration to everybody who wants to fight society’s ingrained bigotry. Whether it’s sexism, homophobia, ableism or any other prejudice that gets characterised as taboo, bigotry has to be fought head on, aggressively and on the terms of the liberators, not the oppressors. We must break their silly rules, just like she did.
Great leaps forward are coming. The bigots and their apologists will be swept aside, and the liberators who were once attacked and ridiculed will ease the way for a more peaceful society that is accepting of difference and respectful of the right to dissent. Without people like Katherine Switzer, such leaps would not be possible.
Ogvorbis at #21:
That is my memory, too! Thank you so much for adding those notes and memories! Reading your account put a smile on my face.
Yes! Such a powerful image! The heat that day was a significant factor (L.A. in August), and here she was, great stride, powering forward, fantastic form, that bright silver-white cap on her head like a beacon as she made the final lap, no one else in sight. 42,195 meters, with a lead assumed before the wall (around 29,000 to 32,000 meters for most runners in a marathon)! Absolutely marvelous, tremendous run. A joy to watch, and I can only guess at the power of emotions she must have felt, during the run and especially during that final lap. Magnificent!
As you say, so great to see how far we have come, and so great to be inspired when we see how far we have yet to go. Thank you for your post. Great great feeling.
Still learning,
Robert