In the summer of August 20, 1922, a crowd of 20,000 spectators cheered at a rare sight: dozens of international women were running in fierce competition, throwing javelins and breaking world records. Alice Milliat, a French athlete who dominated rowing, soccer, and track and field competitions, was fed up with restrictions keeping women from Olympic competitions. So she organized a new Olympic Games—one for women only, the first of its kind.
The 1922 Women's World Games (French Jeux Olympiques Féminins, also "Women’s Olympic Games") were the first regular international Women's World Games and the first Track and field competitions for women. The tournament was held on a single day on August 20 at the Pershing Stadium in Paris.
The modern Olympic Games haven't always been as welcoming and apolitical as they are today. In the early days of the games, women made up a very small percentage of the athletes, and the International Olympic Committee (IOC) only allowed women to compete in a few events. In the 1900 Olympics, only 22 women participated.
After the 1912 Stockholm Games, IOC President Baron Pierre de Coubertin and his IOC colleagues expressed the belief that "an Olympiad with females would be impractical, uninteresting, unaesthetic and improper." The French athlete and activist Alice Milliat wasn't about to settle for that. Milliat founded the Fédération Sportive Féminine Internationale in 1921, and the group immediately decided to establish a women's Olympic Games as an alternative to the male-dominated competition.
The games were attended by 77 participants from 5 nations: Czechoslovakia, France (32 athletes), Great Britain, Switzerland and USA (13 athletes). Members of the American team were: Kathryn Agar, Florieda Batson, Maybelle Gilliland, Lucile Godbold, Esther Green, Ann Harwick, Frances Mead, Maud Rosenbaum, Camille Sabie, Janet Snow, Elizabeth Stine, Louise Voorhees and Nancy Voorhees.
The athletes competed in 11 events: running (60 metres, 100 yards, 300 metres, 1000 metres, 4 x 110 yards relay and hurdling 100 yards), high jump, long jump, standing long jump, javelin and shot put.
Technically, women joined the modern Olympics in 1900, but the sports they could compete in were limited: a few women appeared on sailing, croquet, and horseback riding teams in the early 20th century, but only gentle competitions of tennis and golf were deemed female-appropriate at first. Archery, tennis, figure skating, and swimming were added to the women’s competitions by 1912; by the 1920s, fencing and light gymnastics were allowed, but the chance for women to show their athletic abilities ended there.
The tournament was opened with an Olympic style ceremony. The games attended an audience of 20,000 spectators and 18 world records were set. —Women’s History