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''womenSports'' magazine was the first magazine dedicated to women in sports. It was launched in close conjunction with
Billie Jean King Billie Jean King (née Moffitt; born November 22, 1943) is an American former world No. 1 tennis player. King won 39 major titles: 12 in singles, 16 in women's doubles, and 11 in mixed doubles. King was a member of the victorious United States ...
's
Women's Sports Foundation The Women's Sports Foundation (WSF) is a 501(c)(3) educational nonprofit charity focused on female involvement in sports. Founded in 1974 by tennis player Billie Jean King and initially supported by Olympic athletes Donna de Varona and Suzy Chaf ...
and each issue of the magazine contained a two-page article written by the executive director of the Foundation. It was started soon after Billie Jean's win at the Battle of the Sexes.


History


The Launch of ''womenSports''

Billie Jean King established herself as an extremely talented tennis player very early on in her career. Despite all of the success that she had on the court, however, Billie Jean King still did not feel as though she was given the respect and attention that she, and all other female athletes, deserved. Her feelings on the issue of misrepresentation in the media were heightened when she noticed how much ''Sports Illustrated'' had a lack of coverage for women athletes. Taking matters into her own hands, Billie Jean King decided to launch her own magazine, which become known as ''womenSports'', in order to give women athletes a feeling of pride through the proper coverage, attention, and respect that they deserve. The launch of ''womenSports'' did not see major success right away; in fact, the first issue of the magazine received great backlash, for it seemed to just focus on Billie Jean King herself, rather than other women in the sports world. In order to fix the problem, Billie Jean King and her publishers had to make sure that they were covering different athletes in every new edition of the magazine. Because ''womenSports''focused on profiles and features of new female athletes in each edition, it was seen to never be able to compete with a magazine, such as ''Sports Illustrated'', which sent out weekly updates of what was going on in the world of sports. Although it was not seen to be competing with ''Sports Illustrated'', ''womenSports'' found great success because, even though it had close ties with tennis due to Billie Jean King, it covered all major sports played by women in the United States.


''womenSports''

Billie Jean and Larry King acted as publishers, while Jim Jorgensen was the company president. Rosalie Wright from ''
Philadelphia Philadelphia, often called Philly, is the largest city in the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the sixth-largest city in the U.S., the second-largest city in both the Northeast megalopolis and Mid-Atlantic regions after New York City. Sinc ...
'' magazine was hired as the magazine's editor-in-chief and brought on writers
Anne Lamott Anne Lamott (born April 10, 1954) is an American novelist and non-fiction writer. She is also a progressive political activist, public speaker, and writing teacher. Lamott is based in Marin County, California. Her nonfiction works are largely ...
,
Jon Carroll Jon Carroll (born November 6, 1943) was a columnist for the ''San Francisco Chronicle'' from 1982, when he succeeded columnist Charles McCabe, to 2015, when he retired. His column appeared on the back page of the ''Chronicle''s Datebook section ...
and Greg Hoffman. During its design and launch phase, ''womenSports'' received help from ''
Ms. Magazine ''Ms.'' is an American feminist magazine co-founded in 1971 by journalist and social/political activist Gloria Steinem. It was the first national American feminist magazine. The original editors were Letty Cottin Pogrebin, Mary Thom, Patricia Ca ...
'' publishers
Pat Carbine Patricia Theresa Carbine (born January 31, 1931) is an American feminist and magazine editor. She was executive editor of '' Look'', which was the highest position held by a woman at a general interest magazine, and the vice president and edi ...
and
Gloria Steinem Gloria Marie Steinem (; born March 25, 1934) is an American journalist and social-political activist who emerged as a nationally recognized leader of second-wave feminism Second-wave feminism was a period of feminist activity that began in ...
as well as celebrity PR executive Pat Kingsley. The inaugural issue of ''womenSports'' ()in May 1974 featured Billie Jean King on the cover. Shortly after launch, ''womenSports'' reached a monthly circulation of 200,000. ''womenSports'' won a J.C. Penney-Missouri Award in 1974. (The J.C. Penney-Missouri Awards became the Missouri Lifestyle Journalism Awards in 1994.) Turnover began in 1975 when editor Wright was fired for refusing to print an article written by an advertiser and not marked as such. She was replaced by Cheryl McCall from the ''
Detroit Free Press The ''Detroit Free Press'' is the largest daily newspaper in Detroit, Michigan, US. The Sunday edition is titled the ''Sunday Free Press''. It is sometimes referred to as the Freep (reflected in the paper's web address, www.freep.com). It primari ...
''. ''womenSports'' was sold to the Charter Company, then owner of ''
Redbook ''Redbook'' is an American women's magazine that is published by the Hearst Corporation. It is one of the " Seven Sisters", a group of women's service magazines. It ceased print publication as of January 2019 and now operates an article-comprise ...
'', in 1976 and the company's offices were moved to New York from San Francisco. Then-editor McCall stayed with the magazine, but soon left to become an editor at ''
People A person (plural, : people) is a being that has certain capacities or attributes such as reason, morality, consciousness or self-consciousness, and being a part of a culturally established form of social relations such as kinship, ownership of pr ...
'' magazine. Cutler Durkee moved with the magazine to
New York City New York, often called New York City or NYC, is the List of United States cities by population, most populous city in the United States. With a 2020 population of 8,804,190 distributed over , New York City is also the L ...
, then from ''womenSports'' to ''People'' where he became its executive editor.


''Women's Sports and Fitness''

After Charter ceased publication of ''womenSports'', the Kings reclaimed ownership of the magazine and began publishing it through the Women's Sports Foundation as ''Women's Sports'' (), publishing it monthly from 1979 through 1984. In 1984 the magazine moved to bimonthly publication and subsequently changed its name to ''Women's Sports and Fitness'' ().


''Condé Nast Women's Sports and Fitness''

Condé Nast Publications Condé is a French place name and personal name. It is ultimately derived from a Celtic word, "Condate", meaning "confluence" (of two rivers) - from which was derived the Romanised form "Condatum", in use during the Roman period, and thence to t ...
acquired ''Women's Sports + Fitness'' in 1998 and rolled its monthly ''Condé Nast Sports for Women'' into it to form bimonthly magazine titled ''Condé Nast Women's Sports and Fitness'' (). The magazine continued under that tile through 2000, when Condé Nast closed the magazine. It was folded into ''
Self The self is an individual as the object of that individual’s own reflective consciousness. Since the ''self'' is a reference by a subject to the same subject, this reference is necessarily subjective. The sense of having a self—or ''selfhood ...
'' in late 2000.


Inside ''womenSports''


''Content''

Billie Jean’s ''womenSports'' intended to be a magazine that all women could be proud of. Although the first issue showcased the tennis star a great deal, the editors of the magazine found it difficult to cover women’s sports without including Billie Jean King. Aside from this obstacle, ''womenSports'' was seen as a traditional magazine that showcased articles and features dedicated to women in sports. Because the magazine was more traditional, it was not seen as a feminist magazine despite the fact that ''womenSports'' had a demographic consisting of 98 percent women. Rather than producing coverage of sporting events, ''womenSports'' incorporated self-help articles and profile features of women athletes, highlighting their successes. The magazine focused on a wide range of sports played by women which consist of volleyball, soccer, basketball, softball, field hockey and surfing. With the influence of Billie Jean King, ''womenSports'' created its own “''womanSport'' of the year,” similar to ''Sports Illustrated’s'' Sportswoman of the Year. ''WomenSports'' also gave its readers a history lesson by emphasizing historic female athletes of our time and providing information on which schools offered scholarships to women. Billie Jean King’s vision for ''womenSports'' was to create a personable female magazine; to enhance these characteristics, she was very open to critiques and comments from readers.


''Women Featured''

The magazine ''womenSports'' included profiles of many pioneering women athletes in history that were pushing for change even before Billie Jean King was born. Women that were featured included golfer Glenna Colette Vare and tennis player Hazel Wightman. Both of these women, including many others, were featured in womenSports because of the impact they made for female athletes throughout the world of sports during the time that they were playing. Glenna Colette Vare was the greatest female golfer of her time. Throughout her career, Glenna Colette Vare won six U.S. Women’s Amateur Championships, two Canadian Women’s Amateurs and a French Amateur during a time where there was no Ladies Professional Golf Association Tour. With the success that Vare had in her career, she raised awareness around women’s golf – a sport that had no recognition at the time. In 1975, Vare was part of the first class inducted into the World Golf Hall of Fame due to the impact she made both on and off the course. Hazel Wightman had one of the most distinguished careers in the history of tennis. Due to her consistent efforts on and off the court, Wightman separated herself from all her competition and made an everlasting impact on the sport. Throughout her career, Hazel Wightman won 16 titles at the U.S. National Championship, which included 3 consecutive years of her sweeping the singles, doubles, and mixed doubles. In addition to all of her wins, Wightman contributed to the game of tennis through her creation of the Wightman Cup; similar to the Davis Cup for men, the Wightman Cup was played annually between U.S. and Great Britain up until 1989 when it was disbanded. The creation of the Wightman Cup showed how much Hazel Wightman valued women equality in her sport and how she did everything she could in order to show that to the public. Glenna Colette Vare and Hazel Wightman were just two of the many women that were featured in ''womenSports'' because of the great impact that they had during their time of playing their sport. The inclusion of these women in the magazine was so essential because it showed appreciation and honor towards women that pushed for equality and change during times that women were looked down upon and seen as unequal.


References

{{DEFAULTSORT:Womensports Magazine Defunct Condé Nast magazines Defunct women's magazines published in the United States Magazines established in 1974 Magazines disestablished in 2000 Monthly magazines published in the United States Sports magazines published in the United States Women's sports in the United States