Good morning. Today is March one 2000 and 12 we are conducting an
interview for the Arizona State University retirees Association video
history project. We are located today in the A. S. U. Community Services
building. I am Jill, D Michael and the technical support staff today
include roger carter and Dave Schatz lee. Also in attendance with us is
linda Vance coy. Chair of the A. S. U. R. A video history project. I'm
going to introduce you now to our honoree linda Wells, former head
softball coach at Arizona State University linda. Yes, hi, hi Jill and
thank you for conducting the interview Children. Michael, My name is Linda
Wells. I was the softball coach at Arizona State University between 1989
and 2005
linda. I first met you when I was fortunate enough to be the chair of the
search committee that brought you to the sun devils. Um but before that a
lot happened. Can you begin with describing your early life and your
interest in sports? Yes, yeah, we share um so many things in common Jill,
so I'm so thankful that you're here to do the interview both of us, uh you
know midwest girls and I grew up in pacific Missouri about 30 miles west
of ST louis. I was born december 13th 1949 in Washington Missouri and my
family lived in pacific Missouri. My birth allowed me to join my older
brother ken and then we were soon followed by my sister marty. So my
family lived in pacific and I was also so fortunate to have um both sets
of grandparents that also lived in pacific. So we were great support um as
a family and most of our, I would say athletic and social life revolved
around the neighborhood and also the school environment
in your early years growing up where you did, you were very encouraged to
participate in sports. This is unusual for many of us of our age group. Um
Could you describe your environment and why growing up in Missouri was so
different than where I grew up in Illinois and wasn't encouraged in sports
and I I think we didn't realize I didn't realize this until I of course
became older and exposed to women from across the country, but um I I
think I had several things growing up that kind of were going my way in
terms of athletics, one my parents were very young and they were very
energetic and we would kind of have olympic competitions. For example, my
dad would decide, let's put a clay court in the backyard, so we would do
the work to construct a clay tennis court and then we would learn tennis
and we would play tennis and have fun and then we'd say all right, that's
enough of tennis, let's do broad jump and high jump and basketball and all
the different sports and um the other thing that was happening is that we
lived in a little dirt road in a small town pacific at the time, great
place to grow up, Lots of open fields so you could run across the road
literally and jump on the back of the mule and have a ride or horse ride
or milk the cows or whatever was going on. And next door lived my five
cousins now I matched up with Alan, we were the same age, so there's Don
allen mike, Dennison wayne and that's what we did was play outside. The
rule was see you later play outside, there'll be an announcement for
dinner and that's when you reappear indoors. So we played everything and
we were joined by, you know john Curtis and gary dale and as you can
imagine, I was right in there with all of the boys playing all the sports
and when my mother as she frequently would would say, I don't think you
should do that. My dad would be there to say let her do it if she wants to
do it. So I look back and realize how it must have been difficult for him.
He must have had to swallow a few times along the way, but was very
encouraging and my mother was out there a lot of times participating, you
know, especially we did the archery unit and both of my parents became
very engaged in that we did family bowling and they all bold on leagues
and so I think I just kind of by example and by the activity of the family
was always around sports now by the time I was six it became clear that
something needed to give because I was gonna want to play on the boy's
baseball team. And so my father and other members of the community started
the quarry league for girls and I played cory league softball, followed by
what we then called town softball and played with my sister and you know
the girls that were around in grade school and high school and then by
high school we had organized sport teams in volleyball, basketball and
softball. So it gave me just another opportunity. So I was a cheerleader
for the boys teams and then I was a participant in the, in the high school
activities and um and loved high school and you know played in the band. I
love doing everything. I love being student council and debate and speech
and I think because it was such a small rural environment, they were
always happy for everyone who wanted to to participate. The social
activities of the community revolved around the school and you went on to
college and continued that passion for sports. Um so could you talk a
little bit about, I can, there's one more story that I want to mention. My
dad had played basketball in high school and Ben, um something of an
athlete himself. He was coached at the time by her baker who in addition
to being a physical education teacher at pacific was also a very good
men's major picture and he lived kind of down the street, you know, he had
a couple of sons and they were all very excellent fast pitch softball
players. And one day I think I'm like 12, there's a knock at the door and
it's mr baker and he's talking to my father and saying and I think you
your daughter has some talent, she should be going into the city, which
meant ST louis, Which at that time was 30 miles away, a great distance to
travel. He didn't just go into the city, but he encouraged my dad to put
me on um A. S. A. Teams and the more elite teams. And so I left the town
team environment and I began to engage in Women's sports at the women's
major club level. So at age 12 I'm playing on these women's teams in ST
Louis, starting with softball, but then expanding the basketball and field
hockey and a number of other sports. And this was well before the Time
when there was aged group. So at 12 you got out there and maybe the next
youngest person was 28 and you just set the bench and learned the game and
learned your spot and and that's how you grew into playing sports. So I
had a lot of sport experience before I actually went to college um
I chose Southeast Missouri State in Cape Gerardo Missouri. And in
reflection I'm always so glad I did because it was an era as you know,
before women's athletic scholarships, It was pre title nine. It was at a
time when the professional women in physical education, we're kind of
divided. There were a number of women who thought, you know, women, let's
give them the chance to play on teams. And there were athletic teams that
I played on in college. But there were also the women who were the
professionals and mentor who were still going with, you know, not too much.
It might be too much for them to run full court and basketball and it
might and meanwhile a lot of us coming in, we were already doing all those
things. So I think we were kind of that not that there weren't women
athletes, but I think at the college level, this was the beginning of the
beginning of the thrust for equity and sports. From what I know about
title nine, I would definitely agree with you. In fact, most athletic
departments were men's departments and the women's extra mural sports
association was where the women joined and played and often the
competition wasn't at the same kind of level. It was more like intramural
but with schools outside of your universities. Um, you Also played
multiple sports, which in this decade, 2012 now is very unusual for a
woman student athlete in college to play more than one sport. Can you talk
about that opportunity? Yes, I played, you know, volleyball and basketball
and softball in high school. And of course I didn't realize it was unusual
and so when I went to college I played field hockey, volleyball,
basketball, tennis and softball um as a collegiate athlete and not
thinking anything of it. Um The coaches were very agreeable to working my
schedules and putting me in the competitions they chose. I just I loved
playing, was happy to play, willing to play in whatever practice or
competition they wanted me to appear in and at the same time was by now
driving back and forth the 100 miles to ST louis too often play in a. S. A.
Softball. Um U S V B A. Volleyball au basketball.
And it just felt like that's what you should do. The opportunities were
there to play. So did your friends also participate as actively as you did
? I would say, No, I would say most of the college Women were in one or 2
sports there. I I think it was probably an exception to be in five and
they would also maybe participate in a single sport in the city. But we
had great athletes at the college level. And I remember then it was kind
of the beginning of beginning to meet great athletes from other schools,
from other states, from other areas. So I found my life kind of expanding
from pacific first to ST louis then throughout Missouri and then other
states as we would commonly travel there, especially with s a women's
major softball. Um and my parents were right along, you know, my youngest
sister Jody Jody was born when I was a freshman in college. And so she
lived her little baby life in the stroller under the bleachers while, you
know, and it was another thing that I would mention, I really appreciated
about my parents. They were parents, they love to come, they love to watch.
Um my dad would always, you know, play, we're willing to play catch with
me, throw the ball, go to high school, hit it, but never wanted to intrude
on my ability to be coached by other people. I remember as a very young
player, maybe eight or nine coming home and saying why I'm gonna quit this
team. And I'm, you know, I got somebody else asked me to play and he goes
, mm hmm, well you can quit. He goes, go ahead, He goes, but just know if
you quit, you're you'll never play for another team. I was like, what do
you mean? They want me to play on this team? So he's very good about these
lessons that included, you know, the things that we hope we bring along in
coaching the sportsmanship and I can see how he would, you know, we would
be in the car and I would be all about, you know, how well I had played
and he'd go, well I remember in the third ending, there was this foul tip
and you touched it with your glove. I if you can touch the ball can't you
catch it and you know, I'd spend the next week going, what ball was that
and how could I improve and I could just, you know, I can feel him, he was
, he was helping to push me without being pushy and I look back and really
appreciate now the role that my parents have played and my family as well
throughout my athletic career, I was going to ask you to tell us that
story. I remember you talking about it when you spoke to some young girls
in Arcadia little League, talking about how you were kind of impressed
with yourself and your play that day and your dad gently made a point
about a play, you could have done better and that he was always trying to
encourage you to look a little deeper um, in, in your performance, in your
play in a, in a kind way, but to, to excel in all aspects, being able to
look back at what a positive experience that was because I do think, and
especially when you're from a small town and you have a little talent, it
looks like a big talent in a little town and so as you, you know, kind of
, as the pond gets bigger, you know, the ducks get bigger too, so it has
been um just so important to me to have that support and I think to be
able to appreciate it for, for example, in college, you know, we, a lot of
times the people that were working with you as a college athlete were, you
know, dance people or people that were there to teach team sports or
individual sports, they, there wasn't coaching preparation and I have been
so proud of my relationship with my past coaches, you know, I'm still in
touch with my high school coach and my college coaches and I'm just so
honored to have played for them um and and realize how much time and
energy and especially after you get into the profession that you know, it
takes to give a team or to develop a talent level. Did that influence your
choice then to become a coach? I think it did not, I think um coaching was
not a career option really, I think going in
preparing for a career, going to school was nurse teacher. Mhm I think I
was the nurse teacher years and I chose teacher and then I prepared in
with a physical education major and I love science, so I did chemistry and
biology as miners wished I could have done music, wished I could have done
lots of other things that I was interested in, completed my undergrad, did
my student teaching and went, whoops, there's no way I will be a physical
education teacher in a public school, it was just so not a fit, but it did
press me then because of course now you're at the age, what are you going
to do? You know, and we as we all face that coming out of college, that
what's next? So I decided what would be next for me would be graduate
school. So I applied, I sort of wanted to go to Oregon, I didn't hear from
them but heard from and got offers from several schools, but decided my
best offer was the University of Minnesota. So I went there to do
um exercise physiology and thank you.
My graduate assistantship was to teach in the physical education
department and also work in the exercise physiology lab, that was my
assignment. And at the first staff meeting they said we are paying people
two part time coach, some of the women's teams, so anyone interested. So
they said money, my hand went up, of course you're, you know, you're
living, I think my graduate assistantship for the year was $2400 then, So
the extra $600 that you were going to get to head coach basketball, it
looked great and then it was big money at the time, so that's how I came
about to have an entry into coaching and when I did it, it was a fit, you
know, it was that here is the profession that matches the passion that
goes along with the experience and it was my awareness that I had this
experience, you know, now all the hours of playing in the neighborhood and
being on the high school teams and playing in women's major ball and
driving and you know, giving up other activities to be an athlete.
I could see where that
it was such an advantage probably to most of my peer group at the time.
Well, today's coaches specialize in, they are the head coach of basketball
or softball or volleyball and it's year round and often coaching in the
summer for pan american games or other usa teams or something. But in your
early days of coaching, tell us how many sports you coached in one year.
This, so this was Minnesota now and I'm doing my graduate work. So I'm
taking classes, I'm working in the lab, I'm teaching activity classes and
I'm the head coach for volleyball, basketball and softball. Yes, I figured
it was some kind of multitasking
trailblazing beginning because you were everywhere um in the classroom, a
mentor from your graduate students, I'm sure, um as their teacher and then
also as the coach and then your first full time coaching position. Could
you tell us about that and how many sports you coached after graduate
school? Yes, it was so exciting. And, and this would be the great time to
interject Its title nine now. So this is the beginning of that entire
Experience of Title nine. The feminist movement, women's liberation. It is
all of those wrapped up into one and it's playing itself out clearly on
the college campuses and very exclusively in ways with women's athletics.
So
women's athletics is beginning to be identified as an entity separate from
just whatever the pe teachers want to get together and throw together for
competition. It's being organized. There's the newly formed Association of
Intercollegiate Athletics for Women which has a competitive model of the
student as a student athlete and with a the purpose of of training and
providing competitive experience to really bring forward that student
element of student athletes. Was this the Association of Intercollegiate
Athletics for Women A. I. A. W. There's lots of initials in the sports,
but this is the one that actually eventually combined with the N. C. A. So
many people in women's sports don't realize that the N. C. A. A. Really
wasn't there for women's sports. In the beginning it was actually a group
of women leaders, physical education teachers and coaches who realized
that focusing on women's sports was so important to have their own
organization. Um and and a long history. So there are a I. A. W.
Championships at schools prior to N. C. A. A. Championships in women's
sports. Is that right? That's correct. And the other point that I think is
well worth making is that I don't want the portrayal to be that were the
first athletes there have been great women athletes as as those of us who
are athletes. No, but I think putting athletics on the competitive
collegiate field began to highlight them. So there were a lot of athletes
who participated in women's major softball or played field hockey or
played basketball and were great. And I felt so fortunate because when I
way back, when, when I was 12 years old playing with these older women, I
got to see near a white play basketball and I got to see Dot Wilkinson are
Arizona legend, Play Softball as a youngster. And they were definitely
women that you were looking up to. So we had and always have had these
premier women all throughout the world participating. But I think title
nine brought it home to the creation of opportunity for women at the
college level. And of course it is federal social legislation. You know,
this is not a choice, This is a mandate coming down that there be equity
and of course the threat of the withdrawal of federal funding from schools.
So now there's a lot more interest in women's athletics and the creation
of programs and whatever. So that's the environment that I've walked into
now and now I have the opportunity to Coach. And in 1974,
um, may I w came around the Association of Intercollegiate Athletics for
Women in 1971. So they were there when I went to Minnesota to begin my
graduate degree and started coaching. And then they were also there, of
course, in 1974 in 1974 I became the first full time woman on staff at the
University of Minnesota and coached volleyball, basketball and softball.
That was my appointment. And a lot of times I would get asked, what else
do you do it? Because
it was so uncommon, you know that they didn't, they did not relate it to
the idea that a man might just coach baseball or might just coach football
, but is all you're really doing coaching volleyball, basketball and
softball. And did you have scholarships to award to students? We didn't
immediately have scholarships, scholarships began in the late 70s and they
came about on need base. And so I remember the first athlete that I
recruited um to formally play and it was a basketball player out of Iowa
to come and play at the University of Minnesota on a basketball
scholarship and she like many athletes then played volleyball and
basketball and many played volleyball and softball. And, and then
gradually they begin to be more specialized into singular sport athletes.
And of course then the scholarship money skyrocketed,
which would have been in 1981 when the N. C double A. Kind of took over
the women and embraced them into their model. The Ai W then was a demise
organization and and that's what a lot of people because they're so
familiar with N C double A. They think of that as being the beginning of
collegiate athletic organization. but they really were started by A. I. W.
And then became part of N. C. Double A. In 1981 and then the full
scholarships or approaching full scholarship allotments were coming around.
Then I want to just mention to you too I moved into the Biermann building
at the University of Minnesota. I'm housed next to Herb brooks. The great
ice hockey coach. I do ice hockey um professional ice hockey players as my
master's thesis um body composition and aerobic capacity of professional
ice hockey players. And then the search was on at that time um to see what
was the difference in training between the US and the Russians because we
were very interested and then of course the U. S. Went on to win with
coach brooks and Lake Placid but it was I look back at those times and I
was so exposed to the great then not just the women's side but the great
men coaches including Herb who was outstanding and a great um great person.
I did a coaching basketball camp with Jon Conlan who was the great
Minneapolis Lakers coach and of course the Lakers went on to move out of
Minneapolis for basketball into L. A. So my world is now again just
broadened and greater horizons. I wanted to ask about that basketball
player, your first scholarship recruit because many people might not
realize that the game of basketball that was played um in women's sports
was sort of a half court game. Um, as I'm recalling the roving forward
could cross the, the court and, but everybody else had to stop and, and it
was very weird and I think I, oh, I mean it's weird today, but back then
that was it, you know, you know, it hasn't been but more than a decade
that Iowa, which was the last state to change. And really the reason that
I was changed late, they played, they played a split court then. So you
either played offense on basketball or you played defense on basketball.
When I played in high school, we played with rovers. So we had some
stationary people that just played offense and defense and of course then
the rover. So I love being the rover because you played full court. By the
time I went to college, it was full court basketball and we were of course
at college playing full court. But Iowa remained a split court and it did
really because girls basketball was so popular, they were afraid to change
it that it might really do harm to the game because it was way more
popular for several decades than than really the boys games in the state.
And I think just, you know, stopping to think about how rules were made
for, for girls and women in sports is, is important because it's, it's a
part of history that many will never know unless we talk about it. But in
golf for example, um, people weren't, women weren't allowed to raise their
arms above their shoulders because it was unladylike and um, in uh,
basketball, we were always told that it wasn't good to run that much. So
only a few could. Um, but could you comment on, you know, sort of the
limitations and how rules might be different men and women. And of course
, I think that basketball is a great example where it was half court and
it was also limited dribble like, um, I don't know if you remember that,
but you could dribble the ball three times and then you had to pass and it
was, you know, all of these kind of cultural things which were probably
designed with a good heart thinking, um, you know, women weren't capable
of doing these things, but when you consider women didn't really until
almost the 19 hundreds become full time students in college because, and I
believe that was the University of Wisconsin Madison had the first full
time women in, you know, like 18 95 because they didn't think women could
handle a full time load in college. So our cultural mindset about, um,
well femininity, not women's capabilities to men, the speed and strength
differences. We've gone Really kind of all the way down the road. And it
made me think of that especially, you know, this weekend now we've got,
you know, Danica, she's in the Indy 500 and you, we have women doing all
these incredible things and narrowing really the gap in marathon times and
just so many things are different now and a lot of it attributed really
directly I think from Title nine and the increased opportunity and
exposure especially at the collegiate level because you know, and that's
what are higher institutions are for about changing the culture and
adapting the culture and being the leader, the trendsetter of the culture.
And I think that's true for women's sports. Well there are, I think
sports really helped women helped girls realize how much you could do. I
mean there were lots of things in society like I happen to know that the
Radcliffe women students couldn't use the Harvard library during the day.
They had to go there at night at closing time, check out books and bring
them back. I mean can you believe that? That's an unbelievable, but that's
another example of, of how women were held back. But sports gave women
gave young girls an avenue really to um strive for excellence and not only
in the United States, but also internationally you have a great deal of
experience with the olympics and the pan american games and much of this
coincided with your career coming to Arizona state, but before we talk
about your wonderful career at Arizona State, I'd like you to talk about
your, your international coaching experience where you got to travel in
the world and I remember emails from Beijing about your daily adventures.
Yeah. I just feel like my whole experience was just like a rocket ship.
It just started and just really I've had so many great opportunities the
whole time I met Minnesota of course I haven't given up on myself, so I'm
still playing and competing and um starts out being a field hockey,
basketball, volleyball, I have a U. S. V. B. A. Team that's very
successful and goes to national championships. I'm competing every year in
women's major softball. I started play as you remember back in my story
here when I was 12 and I played to 43 way past the time that I came out to
A. S. U. So I played for a lot of years um in 1975 there was a women's
professional league and it was another kind of step forward
certainly for me and my career. But for so many of us that had spent so
much of our time playing women's major ball, that was the elite level of
competition at the time. Women's major. And most of us now because of the
exposure to the movie league of our own. I can remember the baseball
league back during the war time that was created to replace the men who
had gone off to war and women had um many of them from the state of
Arizona and from the women's major teams in the area had been exposed to
that. But now um here comes a professional opportunity for women in
softball. So that was also now incorporated into my whole atmosphere Of um
coaching and teaching because of course I still always taught classes
while I was at Minnesota. So I tried out for and was successful to make
the Chicago Ravens in 1975. So I played for the Chicago Ravens and we
played 120 ballgames between um May 28 and September three, which made it
essentially a doubleheader every day. So I was a catcher for the Chicago
team and after the first year of the league, the Chicago team folded and I
was drafted out of that to go to ST louis as a pitcher. So I went to ST
Louis, I pitch for them. I played basically every position when I played
women's major ball. It didn't, I didn't care usually I pitched or caught
and then played whatever other position the pitchers and catchers played,
were you right handed left handed, right handed thrower and also a right
handed batter. So um so I go to ST louis now and I am a picture and then
our catchers are injured, so I become a catcher and I play for them a year
and then I become player coach for um the next two years and we're just
this year being going to be recognized by the ST Louis Hall of Fame as a
team. So I'm going to reunite here next month with all my old Hummer
buddies and teammates. So I played for the ST louis hummers and it was
then also the excitement of playing professionally, of certainly going
back and playing in ST louis was a very special time And I was also um
engaging then in international coaching in 1985 I was named um as one of
the United States coaches and we took the United States myself and carol
spanks who was a great and Hall of Fame softball player played out of
California for the California lion, it's and she was the head coach at cal
poly pomona, she and I were named to coach the team and we took the um
United States team, we were the first um female coaching staff ever of a U.
S. Team. We took them to um Melbourne Australia for the South pacific
Classic. We go to the we go to the coaching meeting and it's not starting
and it's not starting and it's not starting and finally I go up and I go
excuse me, but you know when you might be starting the coaches meeting and
they go well we're waiting for the United States to get here because
they couldn't relate to that. We were there, the two women were coaching
the team. So we won the gold medal in the South pacific classic that was
in 1985 and then carol and I were also named to coach the Pan american
Games in 1987 in 1987 the Pan american Games included softball, as they
still do today, but that was the highest level of softball. So softball
had not been included in the olympic games. So coaching in the Pan Am's
was the best you could do. We were thrilled. And we took the team to And
the games were held in Indianapolis perfect. Because a lot of people could
come and support us. And I still remember the opening ceremony was held at
the Indy 500 race way and they put us all on these busses and they give
you these talks about you're gonna climb these stairs and suddenly it's
gonna flatten out and when it does Remember to breathe because you're
gonna walk out in front of 200,000 people and you're thinking, oh, how
hard can this be? You know, we got our little opening ceremony suits on
and you get up there and it flattens out and you cannot breathe. You are
hyperventilating. It's such a thrill to march in and represent your
country. And then we went on to win the gold medal that year. And so it's
another Just super experience for me that was in 1987 and then two years
later I'm mhm making application to become the coach at Arizona state? And
and would you say, would you say that future coaching meetings meetings
started on time now that they recognize this kind of, it was just this
moment, you know, and right, when you think you're, it's always that way,
it's like, right, when you think you're getting over that, like, don't
they know where the coaches know they didn't? And, and uh, and really, as
my kind of global exposure expands,
you now become um, you know, the dichotomy of you are at battle in the
colleges, you are fighting for court time, your practice time budgets,
assistant coaches, you know, you are doing the gender, you know, I feel
like I did the gender equity battle um for a lot of years. Um, but I think
it was title nine before I even realized there was discrimination because
I was playing, you know, I wasn't bothered with, Could I play? I was,
nobody's gonna stop me. And I had, you know, my dad saying, well, she
wants to go hunting, you know, wouldn't let her go, she'll get tired of it.
And then I had finally, my mother saying, when do you think, you know,
this is all good, this Minnesota thing, but when do you think you'll get a
real job? You know, and I don't think my mother got it and understood it
until I went to ST louis and played professionally and then because of the
media and the support and kind of the status that you gain as a
professional athlete. My mom then embraced it and she'd always been good
about coming, you know, but a lot of times the game would be over and and
you'd go up to mom and she'd go on and we win because she wasn't, you know
, really watching and she didn't care. You know, you've had a good time
and you know, she talked to people and it was fun and my, my grandmother
was also a big supporter, you know, and came to the games. My parents went
to the World Series, the college World Series they attended with my
sisters and my niece is probably 15 years in a row. We always went as a
family to the college World Series. So I can see that kind of the
dichotomy of you have to work hard and you're battling. And at the same
time once you get global, it's really quickly apparent the opportunity you
have in the United States in athletics and especially in collegiate and
club and professional athletic programs as a woman in in theUSS