Ivy League Sports

As a long-time coeducational institution, Cornell has a storied history of women’s athletics, though before the 1970s sports were administered largely as an extension of physical education courses. By the early 1970s, Helen Newman Hall, a building originally used for recreational and instructional activities, had been transformed into a multi-purpose facility for women’s intercollegiate sports. And by the fall of 1972, more than 300 women were representing Cornell in a dozen intercollegiate sports — more than any other college or university in the state of New York.

With the growth of interest in women’s athletics in the 1970s, Martha Arnett, director of women’s physical education, identified the shortage of qualified women’s coaches and inadequate budgets as the primary detriments to further development of the program. The $19,000 allocated for women’s athletics came from the women’s physical education budget, while the men’s athletic program had an independent budget of half a million dollars.

Throughout the 1970s, Arnett continued to push for more support, emphasizing the increased time commitment required of teacher-coaches when the numbers of students, level of competition, and frequency of travel kept increasing. “The times when a woman could coach two sports in addition to her teaching responsibilities,” she pointed out, “apparently are over because of the increased demands of coaching.” Finally, the university allocated $5,000 for new programs for the 1976-77 academic year and authorized hiring a trainer to work with women athletes.

But even that was not sufficient to raise Cornell to where Arnett felt the program should be to compete with its peers; nor was it sufficient to meet the new Title IX mandates. In her 1976-77 annual report, Arnett cited requirements still not being met in the areas of coaching, facilities, funds for travel and equipment, sports information, and fundraising. Arnett summarized her continuing frustration: “Cornell, a few years ago, had one of the best athletic programs for women in the country, but we are rapidly falling further and further behind both New York and Ivy schools.”

Cornell acted positively in response to Arnett’s critiques, raising salaries of teacher-coaches and adding new tennis courts, a boathouse, and locker rooms. Other important developments were the media boost provided when Cornell’s sports information office began to handle publicity for the women’s program (previously, Arnett and her staff had managed it themselves) and the assignment of two women coaches as liaisons with the admissions office. Arnett acknowledged the importance of attracting outstanding student-athletes to the program in her 1978-79 report: “As a staff we’re becoming more concerned with recruiting, the admissions process, as well as speaking to alumni. Although we are rather new in these areas, we realize the importance of increased involvement.”

Despite the challenges of the decade, Cornell’s women athletes experienced successes at the state, League, national, and even international level. The undefeated 1974 tennis team, for example, led by Helen Johnson, Sarah Reynolds, and Karen Krinsky, won New York State’s fall championship. Cornell ice hockey teams dominated the Ivy League in the 1970s, winning the first Ivy title in 1976 and five additional titles from 1977 through 1981. By 1978, the four-year-old varsity gymnastics program was also an established power in the Northeast. The 1978 gymnasts, including five freshmen, won the Ivy League championship and finished second in the New York State AIAW meet.

At the national level, Cornell continued its dominance in fencing, winning consecutive titles at the 1972 and 1973 NIWFA championships. In 1972, Peggy Walbridge and Kathy Stevenson were named to the inaugural AIAW All-America four-member fencing team, becoming Cornell’s first fencers to achieve All-American status. Walbridge also was named All-America in 1973 and 1974 and was the AIAW and NIWFA individual national champion in 1974.

Finally, swimmer Hilary Walsh competed internationally in March 1975 when, at an official United States-Soviet Union meet in Leningrad, she won the 200-meter individual medley, finished second in the 400-meter individual medley, and third in the 200-meter butterfly event. Walsh was selected for the six-woman, six-man swimming squad because of her outstanding performance at the Amateur Athletic Union’s (AAU) national championship.