Ina Eloise Young

Ina Eloise Young (February 22, 1881, Brownwood, Texas – May, 1947, Arlington, Virginia) is widely regarded to have been the first American woman sports editor when she started working as 'sporting editor' for The Chronicle-News of Trinidad, Colorado in 1906. In 1908, she became the first woman to cover the World Series which was then known as the World's Championship Games.

Although Ina was listed as Society Editor, Chronicle-News in the Trinidad, Colorado City Directory of 1907, she also reported on sports, particularly baseball, and was named sporting editor of the paper in 1906. At the time, Trinidad was a thriving mining town and attending a baseball game was a popular pastime for the populace of ~10,000. None of the reporters at The Chronicle-News knew very much about baseball or how to keep a box score but Ina was an expert because she had played baseball and learned all about the game from her little brother Robert. Thus, Ina became the paper's baseball reporter and her box scores were judged to be perfect.

Alfred Damon Runyon, who himself had been the sporting editor of The Rocky Mountain News in Denver, Colorado tried to establish a professional baseball league in Colorado in 1907 by attracting talented amateurs from around the country to play against some of the established teams in the state. Over Labor Day weekend in 1907, an All Star team from Denver consisting of at least two players from Chicago, Illinois, played a three-game series against Trinidad's baseball team.

1500 people (~15% of the town) attended the final game. In the photograph to the right taken before the final game on Labor Day, it is believed that Ina Eloise Young is sitting in the center of the front row, above the white dog, with her mother and father seated on her left. This was a good location to keep a box score and report on the game. Although there is no byline, Ina Eloise Young, as sporting editor, certainly wrote the article that appeared in The Chronicle-News on September 3, 1907 about this three-game series. Damon Runyon is possibly standing on the far left with the other dignitaries in the front-center of the photograph. This event illustrates the popularity of baseball in Colorado at the time and shows Ina Eloise Young and Damon Runyon right in the middle of it.

At the 1908 World's Championship Games (World Series), Tim Murnane of the Boston Globe stated the following: "At one game in Detroit I was sandwiched between two celebrated characters. On one side was Battling Nelson, the man of jabs and uppercuts, on the other side was Miss Ina E. Young, representing a Trinidad, Colo. newspaper...Miss Young proved an excellent scorer, was familiar with every inside play and surprised me with the knowledge of the game. The lady was making a tour of the east reporting the important baseball and football games for the enterprising Colorado papers." After the Cub's series victory in 1908, treasurer Tim Murnane of the newly formed Baseball Writers Association nominated Ina as an honorary member. She was approved and gained access to all American and National League ballparks with her membership.

...
Wikipedia