The Influence of Sports on the Life of the American Woman

The opening and the closing word of this talk of mine is that the doors of sport stand wide open before the American woman, who adores it and knows perfectly well how to enjoy all of it, from the time she begins to crawl upon this earth until she is folded away within it. Neither tenderness of age nor the dignity of old years keeps her from the playing fields—no, nor the cruelty of the seasons that have taken their toll of the roundness of her muscles and left them slack.

What pleased me most in my observations was not the school sports, which have become worldwide despite the technical preparation and special systems peculiar to them in America, but rather this sport that continues as a faithful companion to the American woman's life, filling it with health, gladness, and contentment.

The American woman takes her exercise impelled by many factors, chief among them, naturally, her love of sport. It appeared to me that the bodily and moral fatigue and the muscular tension produced by working eight hours a day—the legal working hours—drive her forcefully to spend a few hours of the week in a sport that guarantees her complete relaxation. And I believe another factor of no less importance is the cramped housing, especially in the cities, where houses crowd together and press upon their inhabitants, so that the social circle inevitably narrows too; hence the athletic clubs have become one of the fitting places for meeting and making acquaintance. And just as the factors are many, so are the aims: amusement, or good company, or bodily suppleness and grace, or the athletic art itself.

But however varied the aims, the inner impulse and the demand for recreation and diversion drive her, willy-nilly, to the playing field.

The athletic clubs, whether open-air in their summer simplicity or indoor in winter, are all fitted out with expert thoroughness and equipped with all the modern athletic apparatus and every comfort, from easy chairs to shower baths under sanitary supervision; and the winter courts are distinguished by heating and air conditioning.

If winter has to itself the ball games—basketball, volleyball, bowling—and ice skating, summer has to itself the game of baseball, which, though it is peculiarly the game of males, the women have softened in its sharpness and force and made their own. All the seasons share in delightful sports such as dancing, swimming, tennis, horseback riding, golf, shopping, housework, and the rest.

And since the American woman is exceedingly anxious to keep her slender grace, she has found in sport the best safeguard against stoutness; and if by rare exception she is afflicted with it, she treats it with athletic means, hot baths, and massage.

Worth mentioning is that most forms of social activity, and of athletic activity in particular, take place at night on the days of the week and by day on Sundays and school holidays.

I went one night to watch a bowling game, and how astonished I was at the difference of ages among the players: young women and old women, without exception, filling the place with mirth and gladness.

In the famous Rockefeller Plaza, ringed round by the flags of the United Nations, the ground is frozen artificially in winter, giving skating enthusiasts a pleasant time. Here truly the ages differ astonishingly: from children not yet four years old, to young men and young women, to old men and old women, all skating with lightness and skill and gliding gracefully to the strains of the music broadcast by the loudspeakers. And this is one example among dozens of its like in New York City and thousands throughout the rest of the country.

Swimming is perhaps the most widely popular sport of all with women; shore pools, on sea and river, and artificial pools, indoor and open-air, fill the country, and no community is without them. I was invited one day to visit a women's swimming pool; it was wintertime, and the snow covered the ground to a visible depth, so a doubt crossed my mind about the attendance for swimming on such a day. But I found it teeming with swimmers, and then I remembered that the place is kept warm and the water kept heated to the temperature of the human body. My hostess said to me: "These women are retired from work, so they come by day; the students swim after school hours, and the young working women swim at night after work. This institution, and many others besides, provides a fit place for children and infants, and an attendant who looks after them the whole time the mother is occupied away from them with her own program."

Gardening is a sport enjoyed by those who own houses with land around them, which they make into a flower garden, vying in its design and the excellence of its yield, or a vegetable garden which, if it does not stock the table, doubtless fills a wide gap in its needs.

There exists here a very engaging kind of sport called "shopping," and it is often merely for looking at the displays, when it is called Window Shopping; the lady thereby acquaints herself with the run of prices, the fashions, the latest novelties, and the furnishings, and comes home with her eye sated, her mind enlightened, her body exercised, and her nerves relaxed.

It is no secret that sport has a firm connection with one's economic situation. A friend said to me: "My weekly income does not reach to my own desires and the children's requirements, which must always be put foremost; so my sport is confined to the housework, which I finish to the strains of music from the radio. For instance, when I wash the clothes, hang them out, and iron them, I exercise the muscles of the chest and arms; and when I scrub the floor, I exercise the muscles of the abdomen and legs."

A friend once poured out her troubles to me, saying: "When troubles pile up on me and grow tangled and sleep flies from my eyes, I get up and go to the windowpanes and wash them, or to the floor and mop it and dry it, or I get ahead of washing and ironing day, and I keep working until I feel completely relaxed, whereupon I go up and sleep my fill."

The director of athletic affairs at the Young Women's Christian Association in the city of Brooklyn, one of the important women's institutions in America, told me: "I once attended a match in the game of hockey between a team of young Englishwomen and another of Americans, and the spectators' attendance was at its very peak. The spirit of the play was what most caught the public's eye: the Englishwomen play for the sake of the game and the athletic art, and the Americans play for pleasure, good fellowship, and letting themselves go."

And the American woman, in addition to her particular passion for practicing athletic games, is keenly interested in watching the play of the professional athletic teams, or in following their news, which is broadcast and pictured with precision and enthusiasm over the air. And so "sport has been and will remain part of the American woman's soul."