In a League of Their Own! By Gail J. Newsham – Book Review

In a League of Their Own!
The story of the Dick, Kerr Ladies Football Team
By Gail J. Newsham

Paperback – 172 pages

A lovely history of the Dick, Kerr Company women’s team that started in Preston, Lancashire, England in 1917 to raise money for charities. (The first recorded women’s game in England was on Saturday, March 23, 1885 at the Crouch End Athletic Ground in north London arranged by the British Ladies Football Club). By 1920 Dick, Kerr Ladies Team played before a paying crowd of 53,000 in Everton, the next year the English FA banned women from playing on FA affiliated pitches, a ban that kept women out of the English FA for over 50 years. Meanwhile the Dick, Kerr team kept the women’s game alive for the next 40 years. This book covers the women, scandals and prejudices that the players met during their efforts to play soccer. Well worth reading, and it helps put into perspective the current explosion of women’s soccer in the world.