St. John’s Women in Sports (Published in Gadfly, Sept 2015)

By Mary Kate Eckles 

     St. John’s women have been involved in the St. John’s athletic program since the very first co-educational class set foot on campus. There was a general uproar in the year 1950/1 when the students of St. John’s College discovered the college would be admitting women the next academic year. One of the main sources of uproar among the students was the fact the had not been consulted. Just two years previously, the Polity had been heavily involved in the racial integration of the college, but this year had only found out because of a reporter asking question around campus.  Lots of changes were afoot and as we all know, Johnnies don’t like change. The school was trying to accommodate financially, now that they had fewer GI’s coming in and gain back their accreditation. The Polity called an all-college meeting with the dean where concerns such as the distraction from studying women would cause were raised. Students who were genuinely against women in the college were in the minority and 24 women were admitted to the incoming freshmen class (6/8 graduated). 

    The intramural program the first class of women were involved in was divided teams be year. The freshman, sophomore, junior, and senior teams played basketball, football, volleyball and football. Sarah Covington became the pitcher for the freshman softball team. Many other of the sports teams we enjoy today existed as clubs, such as sailing and crew. Elisabeth M. Chiera from the first class of women was an avid sailor. Women in general were a bit more involved in the Reality weekend event called the “Real Olympics”. It used to include nonsensical games like chariot-racing with children’s wagons and tossing the tabor. The last remnant of the event is Spartan Madball.  

    With the first class of women also came the long held tradition of a female gym assistant specifically hired to help the athletic director with female students. The intramural program began to look like what we have today in the 1960’s when Bryce Jacobson became athletic director. He was not full time, as he was also a tutor, but he revolutionized the program. Thus the teams we know and the draft were born. He also helped create the women’s intramural programs which would eventually become Kunai.

     As reported by Roberta Gable, the co-athletic director with Mr. Dink after Mr. Jacobson retired (specifically the female sports director), the first women’s intramurals teams were the Same and the Other. The first Kunai teams mentioned on the plaques on the elevated track of the Iglehart gym were the second wave of teams Ms. Gable mentioned, The Ancients, the Medievals and the Moderns. The third wave of teams was the Amazons, the Maenads, The Daughters of Camilla (the DC’s or Furies), and the Nymphs. As mentioned, when Mr. Jacobson retired Ms. Gable and Mr. Dink had a short-lived run. Ms. Gable ran the bookstore and Mr. Dink was a tutor like Mr. Jacobson before him, so the there was never any full time athletic director. Ms. Gable quit in protest and thus Leo Pickens was hired. Apparently in this time between Mr. Jacobson and Mr. Pickens, the girls’ locker room in the Iglehart was drastically improved upon. Our space used to only include what is on our right when we walk in. The door used to be where the water fountain is. 

   Mr. Pickens arrived on the scene in 1988. Everyone one, male and female, was assigned a properly gendered team as a freshman and drafted in their league again as sophomores. The only women that had been allowed to play on a men's team were two female gym assistants who were hired to ref woman's games, so they could stay unbiased. The bringing in of a new athletic director, however, brought in a lot of changes.

     The women’s teams started drafting anew every sport to balance out the amount of skill and experience on each team. So already the four women’s intramural teams were fading.  The women's teams were also having general numbers problems at this time, they only were getting enough people for one team of soccer. In the late 80's and 90's, however, women's collegiate club teams were popular among other colleges. Mr. Pickens felt that since the women had the numbers for one team they could play as one team. This is the birth of Kunai Kthonvai (Bitches that guard the Gates of Hell). The year was 1992.

    Mr. Pickens made up a schedule. We played Washington College, Hood College, St. Mary's College, the Naval Academy, and the Key school in soccer.  We did this for one year of basketball as well, but it wasn’t as popular. When we weren't playing other school we were practicing for the next game. The first semester was soccer and basketball and second semester was always more experimental and pick-up style. 

    Our relationship with Washington College in the year 1995/1996 was so good, Mr. Pickens arranged the Smith-McDowell cup. As we know the Washington College team never showed, but we had 40 something girls turn out and we played ourselves. He considered it the resurgence of women's sports at St. Johns. This hey-day of Kunai history lasted to about 2010.

    We stopped playing other colleges as much, but now the women's intramural program was generally known as Kunai. Apparently we can thank Abe Schruner (Sp?) for our name. He was a tutor who was very involved in the sports on campus. He helped Mr. Pickens run Kunai during our intercollegiate days. (He gave LP his blazer when he left the college to start wine-making, and the Hell Bitch blazer soon followed). One day girls were running late for practice and Mr. Pickens called these late players a certain derogatory word under his breath and Mr. Schroner thought is would work perfectly as our team name.

    The segregated intramural team system was still mostly in effect. The first steps for integration happened early on in Mr. Pickens tenure. It was almost accidental. They same year he came on, some guys recruited two girls to play on their team for March Madness basketball second semester and no one stopped them. The women's captains intervened afterwards. 

    They had the same concerns we do about the A-team/B-team comparison. It was agreed upon if any woman who wanted to play with the men's teams would have to be an active member and facilitator of the women's teams. This was basically in effect as long as Mr. Pickens was in charge. While he officially transferred over into being the Alumni director in 2012, he had been easing himself out for some time.

    This means that Mike Maquarrie basically ushered in the completely co-ed intramural program. Not only is Grace Athens-Linden the first girl drafted for intramurals as we know it, but Grace, Sueanna Kiem and Gina Vandetty are also the first female captains. 

    Crew and fencing were all fairly casual extra sports that only really became clubs when LP came along. He was the first full-time athletic director. They were both integrated from inception, but for competitions had to split into girls and guys’ teams. Sailing started in the early 2000's and was the same. While croquet has been mostly male dominated due to practice being the same time as Kunai, there have been female imperial wickets.