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Betsy Jochum, 104, Dies; Last Original Member of Women's Baseball League
Betsy Jochum, the last of the 60 players from the inaugural season of what became known as the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League — which decades later inspired Penny Marshall's 1992 film, 'A League of Their Own' — died on May 31 at her home in South Bend, Ind. She was 104.
Her death was announced by Carol Sheldon, vice president of the league's players association.
'When I got picked to play in the league, it was amazing,' Jochum (pronounced JOCK-em) told The South Bend Tribune in 2012. 'I was actually going to get paid for playing a game. Girls didn't do that back then.' At $50 a week, she was earning more than her father, a carpenter.
In 1943 she joined the South Bend Blue Sox, one of four teams in what was initially called the All-American Girls Softball League.
Philip K. Wrigley, the chewing-gum mogul and owner of the Chicago Cubs, started the league to maintain fan interest in baseball during World War II, when many major leaguers were serving in the military. The other teams that first season were the Kenosha Comets and the Racine Belles, in Wisconsin, and the Rockford Peaches, in Illinois.
In her rookie season, the 5-foot-7 Jochum played in the outfield, batted .273, led the league in hits, stole 66 bases and was chosen for the All-Star Game at Wrigley Field in Chicago, the home of the Cubs. Players from South Bend and Rockford beat rivals from Kenosha and Racine, 16-0. The game, which drew 7,000 fans, raised money for the Red Cross and other wartime causes.
Jochum fared even better in 1944. Her .296 batting average led the league, and she stole a remarkable 127 bases, including seven in one game. She earned the nicknames Sockum Jochum and Sultana of Swat.
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