Ladies' Initiated in Baseball Day

Ladies’ Day was a popular marketing campaign in the 1920s and 1930s that offered free entry to professional baseball games for women 16 and older.

It was particularly successful at Wrigley Field, and spread throughout Major League Baseball in the 1980s.

Ladies’ Day existed as early as the 1880s, but gained popularity after World War I. Ladies Days promotions in the 19th century required women to be accompanied by a man. But even with the lack of a male requirement clause included in later Ladies’ Day games, the general idea of ​​the promotion persisted in that women would bring along another significant man; the man's paid ticket will compensate for the woman's free ticket.

But the promoters didn't anticipate how successful Ladies’ Day would be. In fact, it's so successful that women will bring their female friends with them instead of the intended boyfriends. The 1929 Chicago Cubs season saw more than 200,000 participants in Ladies’ Day. The National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum collection includes tickets to Wrigley Ladies’ Day from May 9, 1930.

In one example, the Ladies’ Day promotion at Wrigley Field drew 33,000 people, as opposed to 12,000 the day before. Realizing the success of Ladies’ Day, Cubs management at Wrigley Field began limiting the number of free tickets for women. It is considered as a big attempt to keep female guests from taking over our premises until we exclude paying patrons.

Although the Ladies’ Day promotions were extremely successful, they began to receive negative criticism. Newspapers have published unflattering caricatures and ill-advised jokes about women cheering at the wrong time at games, implying that women can't understand the intricacies of baseball. Other articles try to support Ladies’ Day female fans. However, many of these articles still convey condescending messages such as, “… to us, it seems that there are fewer false positives now than in the past.”

Wrigley Field was a successful venue for dozens of Ladies’ Day promotions during the first half of the 20th century.

Some male spectators at Ladies’ Day games complained that women stood at inappropriate times and displayed too much enthusiasm. These arbitrary complaints - often without substantiation - are often made with the aim of making female audiences feel like real fans. Other articles described alleged cases where women threw their shoes at the referee or scuffled in the stands, as ways of discrediting the female fan experience. If true, these cases are few and in between and almost seem odd by current standards of fan behavior.

Ladies’ Day promotions often include free admission for women. These promotions ended in the 1980s due to legal action at National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum.

Ladies' Day promotions also became an opportunity to comment on the appearance of female fans. Women can be admitted if they “… smile and look pretty”. Ballparks also started partnering with businesses to provide free plastic hats on Ladies’ Day. Wrigley Field, who was overwhelmed by the success of the promotion, tried to appeal to a crowd of women by encouraging retailers to start their own Ladies’ Day campaigns on game days. This is an attempt to lure women away from the soccer field and into the shopping malls.

Unfortunately, women have also been accused of neglecting their duties at home while visiting the football field. One article has stated that some women are often more loyal to her team than to the old man, who is probably at home wondering when he is going to have dinner.”

But despite resistance from the press, disgruntled men, and even the football fields themselves, women continued to visit games and make Ladies’ Day promotions a success for many years.

A promotion of Ladies’ Day continued after World War II and through the Civil Rights era, but was eventually discontinued in the 1980s due to counter-discrimination claims in Abosh and New York Yankees. But the impact of the promotion can be felt today as the major League Games see near-equal attendance by both men and women.

While Ladies’ Day promotions sometimes attract negative attention, the game's unprecedented popularity has proven that women desire a spot on the football field just as much as men do. The women who assert the right to visit a football field reflect the larger fight for equal rights in American Culture.