Barbara Berger (December 6, 1930 – January 27, 2016) was an American baseball

catcher Catcher is a position in baseball and softball. When a batter takes their turn to hit, the catcher crouches behind home plate, in front of the (home) umpire, and receives the ball from the pitcher. In addition to this primary duty, the catc ...

who played in the

All-American Girls Professional Baseball League The All-American Girls Professional Baseball League (AAGPBL) was a professional women's baseball league founded by Philip K. Wrigley, which existed from 1943 to 1954. The AAGPBL is the forerunner of women's professional league sports in the Uni ...

. Listed at 5' 2", 120 lb., she batted and threw right handed. Born in

Maywood, Illinois Maywood is a village in Cook County, Illinois, United States, in the Chicago metropolitan area. It was founded on April 6, 1869, and organized October 22, 1881. The population was 23,512 at the 2020 census. History There was limited European-Am ...

, Berger and her younger sister,

Norma Norma may refer to: * Norma (given name), a given name (including a list of people with the name) ** Norma Lizbeth Ramos, a Mexican bullying victim Astronomy *Norma (constellation) * 555 Norma, a minor asteroid * Cygnus Arm or Norma Arm, a spiral ...

, played baseball and basketball together during their childhood and later played softball in grade school.The Women of the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League Berger entered the league in 1949 with the Chicago Colleens, a rookie touring team which played exhibition games against the Springfield Sallies as they travelled primarily through the South and East. The next season she was promoted to the

Racine Belles The Racine Belles were one of the original teams of the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League playing from through out of Racine, Wisconsin. The Belles won the league's first championship. The team played its home games at Horlick F ...

, where she was used sparingly as a backup catcher. She hit a .176

average In colloquial, ordinary language, an average is a single number or value that best represents a set of data. The type of average taken as most typically representative of a list of numbers is the arithmetic mean the sum of the numbers divided by ...

in 11 games. The same season, Norma Berger joined the league as a

pitcher In baseball, the pitcher is the player who throws ("Pitch (baseball), pitches") the Baseball (ball), baseball from the pitcher's mound toward the catcher to begin each play, with the goal of out (baseball), retiring a batter (baseball), batter, ...

for the Sallies. She left the league in 1951 to attend

University of Illinois The University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign (UIUC, U of I, Illinois, or University of Illinois) is a public university, public land-grant university, land-grant research university in the Champaign–Urbana metropolitan area, Illinois, United ...

, where she earned bachelor's and master's degrees and taught at her alma mater for 19 years. She married George Brown in 1969, and lived in

Murray, Kentucky Murray is a Home rule in the United States, home rule-class city in Calloway County, Kentucky, United States. It is the County seat, seat of Calloway County and the 19th-largest list of Ky cities, city in Kentucky. The city's population was 17,3 ...

. In 1988, the Berger sisters received further recognition when they became part of ''Women in Baseball'', a permanent display based at the

Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum The National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum is a history museum and hall of fame in Cooperstown, New York, operated by a private foundation. It serves as the central collection and gathering space for the history of baseball in the United S ...

in Cooperstown, New York which was unveiled to honor the entire All-American Girls Professional Baseball League.Obituary

Career statistics

Batting Fielding

Sources

{{DEFAULTSORT:Berger, Barbara 1930 births 2016 deaths Baseball players from Cook County, Illinois Sportspeople from Maywood, Illinois University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign alumni Chicago Colleens players Racine Belles (1943–1950) players 20th-century American sportswomen