Women’s sports, sex, and the Supreme Court

I am old enough to remember what girls’ sports looked like before Title IX and old enough to know exactly what we stand to lose if we forget why it mattered.

In 1974, shortly after Title IX became law, my father founded the Southline Athletic Association, a nonprofit youth sports organization in western New York. What he did with Southline seemed ordinary to him but was radical for its time: the organization included girls. To the best of our knowledge, it was the first athletic association in New York State to do so.

Southline launched girls’ tee-ball and softball teams. Three hundred girls signed up. Clearly, there was demand.

No one had told my father to do any of this. He did it because he had three