Women's+Sports-+Important+People

=**__Important People__**=


 * **Billy Jean King-** Great tennis player in 1970's. Formed a women's league and demanded higher pay. In 1971, she was the first women to earn $100,000 in one season. Bobby Riggs, who was a good tennis player, challenged her to a tennis match, he was sure he would win because she was a woman. The first time Bobby Riggs challenged her, she was getting over a cold and a sore throat. She still played him but after the second game in the match she forfeit the game and ran off the court. Months later she set up another match with Bobby Riggs. When this match was over she won.


 * **Bernice Sandler-** Helped form Title IX. Applied for many jobs and she had great qualifications, but didn't get any of them. When she asked a friend why, he said "You come on too strong for a woman." She became a feminist and fought for women's rights. She gathered people to testify for discrimination based on sex in court. Sandler wrote about the hearings 1,300 pages. Rep. Green (see below) made 6,000 copies for each member of congress to have one.


 * **Donna De Varonda-**When she was 17 she won two gold medals in the Tokyo Olympics. The first gold medal was for the 400-meter individual medley. The second medal was for the 100- meter freestyle relay. By the age of 17, she had broken 18 world records. Donna De Varonda was the first woman to commentate for sports. She helped found the Women's Sports Foundation.

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 * **Mable Fairbanks-**In 1939 she bought a pair of skates for a dollar and told herself she was going to learn to be a skater. She learned how to skate on a little patch of ice in her backyard. When she knew how to skate she went to a local ice rink. The owner of the ice rink made her practice before it opened for the day. One morning she met Maribel Vinson who taught her for free and in secret. By the 1940s she had passed all required competition tests but she was unable to join because of her color. In the late 1950s and early 60s she moved to teaching skating lessons. Many of the students she taught went on to world and national competition success. The racism she saw only made her more determined make a skating career for herself. She died days before getting into the Women's Sports Foundation. She would be remembered for her remarkable strength and determination that got her where she wanted to be in life.
 * Go back to Women's Rights - Breaking Barriers in Sports (Title IX)**