known as the First Lady of Radio started her broadcast career in 1922 when she was hired to run the radio station WGU later known as WMAQ in Chicago She was the first station manager of the city's second ever radio station Waller produced the first play by play radio broadcast of a college football game in 1924 when the University of Chicago beat Brown University 19 7 Then she pursued the idea of putting Major League Baseball MLB games on the air too Chicago Cubs home games were broadcast on WMAQ starting in 1926 During World War II 1939 1945 a shift took place in the workforce Before the war it wasn't common for women to work outside the home But with men serving in the armed forces many women began taking their place to keep the country running During this time Mary Garber launched her sports journalism career in Winston Salem North Carolina She filled in for the sports editor of the Twin City Sentinel when he joined the US Navy in 1944 Covering sports was a man's world so Garber often had to sit with players wives in the crowd instead of in the press box She faced 7 Baseball legend Ted Williams meets with a group of reporters all male in the Boston Red Sox locker room in 1942
8 Mary Garber puts the finishing touches on a story in 1998 She was still reporting on high school sports at the age of 82 other challenges too Garber was banned from the locker rooms treated differently by coaches and players and often ignored by other sports writers
9 MIDY MORGAN Maria Midy Morgan was considered the first female sportswriter She covered horse racing for The New York Times starting in 1869 Morgan moved to New York from Ireland and took the only job available at the paper livestock reporter It was a good fit as she had grown up around horses Morgan spent 23 years covering the livestock market news horse racing and dog and cat shows Of course Morgan was a rare exception It would be decades before other female sports reporters joined the field But Garber stuck with it and became a true pioneer among female sports journalists In 2005 she was the first woman to receive the Associated Press Sports Editors Red Smith Award for major contributions to sports journalism As she accepted the award Garber reflected on her impact on the industry I hope some little girl out there knows now that she can be a sportswriter if she wants to be Then there's Lawrie Mifflin the first female sports reporter at the New York Daily News Her big break came at the 1976 Summer Olympics when the Daily News sent her to Montreal Canada to cover gymnastics women's
