Research Notes for Women at Play: The Story of Women in Baseball

Research Notes for Women at Play: The Story of Women in Baseball is a chronological collection of public domain newspaper articles and public documents — research information on which Women at Play was based. 


Research Notes, Volume 1 documented women ballplayers of the late 19th Century, most of them Bloomer Girls. 


Volume 2 documents six women who played on otherwise all-male teams from roughly 1890 through 1935: 


Lizzie Arlington, who signed a minor-league contract in 1898 

Alta Weiss, who pitched against men’s teams throughout Ohio 

Lizzie Murphy, who played semipro ball for over twenty years 

Edith Houghton, who was playing semipro ball at the age of ten 

Jackie Mitchell, who struck out Babe Ruth and Lou Gehrig in 1931 

Babe Didrikson, who pitched spring training against major league teams 


Volume 2 offers the most important of the newspaper and magazine articles about these six players, some articles in their entirety and some in summary. Included at the end of the volume is “The Only Lizzie,” an article about Lizzie Arlington. 


This book will be of interest to baseball researchers in general, to women in baseball who want to know their history, to people who enjoy reading old newspaper articles, to high school English teachers who assign research topics and papers to students, and to all teachers interested in introducing students to primary source materials.