In 1966, Joy Hawkins worked as a public address announcer for late-season games at D.C. Stadium (later renamed RFK Stadium) at the suggestion of her father, Bert Hawkins, the team's public relations director.
“We've tried everything else,” he said at the time. “It's probably going to be a welcome novelty for baseball fans to have a female announcer.”
Joy Hawkins, then known by her married name Joy Hawkins McCabe, was a 24-year-old actress who played Laura in the amateur production Damn Yankees.
In a recent phone interview from Key West, Fla., where he is artistic director and director of the Red Barn Theater, Hawkins recalled that his father suggested the role on game day.
“I had no preparation,” Hawkins said. “I was doing theater and not really interested in baseball, so he fed me everything. I thought it was an interesting idea and I loved his guts to do it. I was always grateful. It was fun, it was well received, and my photo was featured in the newspaper.”
Hawkins said she wasn't nervous because she's used to performing in front of people.
On Saturday afternoon, September 24, 1966, more than 2,400 fans attended the game between the 9th place Senators and the 4th place Chicago White Sox, but Washington lost 6-2.
Sportswriter Bob Addy wrote in the Washington Post, “Yesterday, the Washington Senators, who rarely led in anything, introduced the first female public address announcer in Major League history, Mrs. Joy Hawkins McCabe.'' “It was my first time,” he quipped. He described how the pitchers were warming up, along with the day's batting lineup, “when Mrs. McCabe's soft, clear voice came over the PA system.”
“The crowd roared in disbelief and the umpire looked towards the press box to see if someone was joking. Players poured in from both dugouts, announcing the end of the new male domination. I looked at the first woman to hit with curiosity.
Or, as Hawkins recalled, “I'm sure you could hear the murmur of the crowd.”
She said her father was right to do something different for the Senators, which drew just 576,000 fans that year, nearly 200,000 fewer than the Kansas City Athletics, which had the second-lowest attendance. said.
“He was the public relations director, so his job was to come up with as many innovative ways as possible,” said Hawkins, now 82. “That was a really bold move in that time and place.” Ta. (Phil Hochberg, the team's regular PA announcer, missed about the last month of the season for basic training.)
She said she wished her father had been as passionate about baseball as she was, since she was raised as an only child and her brother died at a young age.
“But my heart was into theater and dance and everything else,” Hawkins said. “My father also loved theater, so he used to take me to theaters in New York from a young age.”
She went on to have a long acting career. In 1971, the senator's last year in Washington before moving to Texas, Hawkins starred in another Washington production, “Damn Yankees.”,” A program that focuses on the incompetence of senators. The Post's theater critic Richard L. Coe described her as “sexy and charming” Laura.
In his review, he wrote that the production was “greatly timed to inject a glimmer of hope into the team at this moment – 'You Gotta Have Ho-ho-ho-Hope'”, noting that the play's famous song A play on the word “heart.” It's the most perfect lowest point I've ever reached. ”
That was a bit of an exaggeration, but the Senators were in last place in the American League East at the time.
Hawkins was the resident comedian on the television variety show “The Dean Martin Show.'' She played a “pretty girl” in the 1980 film “Cuba Crossing”. She has appeared in several television series. She has also appeared in many regional theaters, with Redburn Theater where she has directed over 90 shows.
Like Hawkins, Kavner, the new A-League play-by-play announcer, comes from a baseball family, the daughter of a coach. She is married to former minor league pitcher Stephen Spurgeon. But during the same season Kavner made history, the nearby San Francisco Giants faced backlash over the departure of longtime public address announcer Renell Brooks-Moon.
When Hawkins took the reins as the PA announcer for that one game in 1966, she had no sense that she was making history.
“As the years have gone by, I think it's become much more tangible than it was then,” Hawkins said. “I just wanted to please my dad and do a good job for him.”
A few years later, she played a character called “Tiger Girl” on “The Dean Martin Show.” In the 1972 skit, Martin leads Hawkins through the park wearing an enchanting tiger costume.
“I always wondered why the feminist police didn't come and get me at that point,” she said with a laugh. “I was his pet, and we did little skits and sang songs afterwards. It was very cute, and it was never weird. But it was very strange to be walked on a leash in 1972. It seems to me.”
Some of the attitudes of the time toward women can also be seen in the coverage of her landmark game at D.C. Stadium.
“With her black hair, blue eyes, and toned figure, Mrs. McCabe would win any contest as arguably the best-looking public address announcer in baseball,” Addy wrote in the article's kicker.
But Hawkins said he wasn't offended, given his friendship with the writer.
“Bob Addy always did that. He was a dear friend and always supported me throughout my career and always said something about the way I looked,” she said. . “That's just the way he was, the way he was back then. And I know there was no harm done by it.”
When Shelley Davis became the Giants' announcer in 1993, it had been nearly 30 years since an MLB team had hired a full-time female public address announcer.
“Why on earth did it take so long?” Hawkins asked rhetorically. “Maybe five years, but maybe 30 years?”
Baseball is slowly making progress in that regard. In 2020, the Miami Marlins named Kim Ng general manager, the first woman to hold the position, but she resigned last year citing disagreements with the team's front office plans. In 2022, Alyssa Nakken replaced the ejected coach as the Giants' first base coach, becoming the first woman to coach on the field in a regular season game. She's still on staff in San Francisco. And Jen Pawol, a minor league umpire who worked spring training games this year, is on track to become MLB's first female umpire.
Back in 1972, Hawkins gave Martin a peck on the cheek just before the show's final joke. In it, Martin referred to a “survey” of college students asking the question, “Should girls wear padded bras?”
The results were: 27 people said yes, 31 people said no, and 18,000 people said only in case of female referees.
After half a century, the birth of “female referees'' like female announcers is no longer a punch line.
