PEABODY — 50 years ago, a 10-year-old girl named Janine Cinseruli grew up loving the game of baseball. From playing stickball and other games in the streets of her Peabody neighborhood, when she was old enough, she went to sign up for Little League Baseball. Little did she – and the rest of the world – know, this was going to be bigger than just a baseball game.
“I was born athletic. Some people are naturally born athletic, and I happened to be one of those people,” Cinseruli said. “Baseball just gravitated toward me and I gravitated towards it. I was really good at it. It just came naturally to me and it was something that I loved.”
However, Massachusetts Little League didn’t accept her because she was a girl – its charter stated the league was only for boys. Cinseruli was one of approximately 20 girls to file a lawsuit against Little League for a right to play.
“When I wanted to play with the boys, I couldn’t do it,” she said. “They said the reason was because I was a girl. It had nothing to do with my skill. From there, I went home and told my mom and my mom called the Peabody Times and they just threw a little blurb in the paper – and that’s when it took off.”
Looking back at the 1970s, from Title IX to the infamous Billie Jean King match against Bobby Riggs in the “Battle of the Sexes,” women started to break barriers.
“There was a lot of change going on in the world for women,” Cinseruli said. “At that time, I didn’t even think women were eligible to get a credit card without a husband’s signature. That was at a time when things were happening for women.”
When Cinseruli asked why she was denied Little League eligibility, a representative simply said it was because she was a girl. Cinseruli, knowing that wasn’t a great reason, went home and told her mom, who agreed that it was “silly.”
“I didn’t cry. I didn’t throw my glove. I just didn’t understand it. It was something that was really foreign to me and I didn’t understand it. At that age, you’re not really privy to what’s going on in the world. You’re just a kid. All I wanted to do was play baseball and eat ice cream,” she said.
The Peabody Times blurb started to gain traction and, soon enough, Cinseruli had a team ready to fight for her.
“The first thing I remember most was when the Mass Council Against Discrimination picked it up and they called me and said they’ll fight for me if I want to do this,” Cinseruli said. “I said I wanted to fight. I didn’t think it was a big fight. I just wanted to play baseball.”
Cinseruli recounts all of the traveling she had to do, from Peabody to Boston, and remembers how intimidating the men in suits were.
“I remember going into Boston to go and meet with them and they had an office downtown and I remember sitting in the waiting room, waiting with my mom. It was the morning after Hank Aaron hit his 715th home run and I remember watching it on TV. I was like, ‘Wow, hitting his record-breaking home run and here I am going to play the same game.’” Cinseruli said. “The other point I remember was going to the Supreme Court. Taking the bus to the suburb of Boston was pretty far. We got to the Massachusetts State Supreme Court and walked to the court and I just remember these grown men asking me all of these crazy questions while I was on the stand. I just remember thinking to myself, ‘I just want to play baseball and eat ice cream.’ These grown men are drilling a 10-year-old girl about playing baseball.”
With the case being argued in court, Little League shut down, meaning parents and kids from all across the nation were growing impatient. Cinseruli admitted to the pressure getting to her at times. Luckily, she had an amazing support system behind her.
“People would call the house and say bad things. People would drive by our house and throw rocks at it. Everyone was so upset that Little League wasn’t playing. People were pissed and it was all my fault,” Cinseruli said. “My family was so supportive of me. My parents, my aunts, uncles, my brothers, my sister, I had a great supportive team around me. There were a lot more supportive people than haters.”
In a 1974 interview with WCVB Channel 5’s Natalie Jacobsen, she asked Cinseruli if she wished she was a boy so she could play.
“I held my breath when Natalie asked me if I wanted to be a boy. I blurted out, ‘I just want to play,’” she said.
The ACLU, working with Cinseruli’s parents, filed a lawsuit seeking a temporary restraining order. Judge Sam Adams, who had only been on the bench for about a year, heard the case. In a 2014 interview with the Peabody Weekly News, Adams admitted that some of his older peers were kidding him about the case.
“They were making the case about whether or not girls should be allowed to play when it wasn’t about that at all,” Adams said. “It was about the fact that, under the law, it was illegal to discriminate on the basis of gender when federal funds were involved. That was the dispositive issue.”
The MCAD later ruled that because Peabody Little League was a public accommodation, it could not discriminate on the basis of gender.
When the decision came out in 1974 – allowing girls to play in Massachusetts Little League – Cinseruli recalls her entire neighborhood being excited that she could play, and local kids were glad Little League was back.
In her first game as a member of Little League Baseball that year, Cinseruli struck out 16 batters and was later named to the All-Star team.
“There were some men along the way who were really ahead of their time. I know not every man who coached wanted to have a girl on the team, but there were three men who didn’t care if I was a girl. Ritchie Medina, Bob Heil, and Charlie Heil – they were ahead of their time. They didn’t care if I was a boy or a girl. They just cared for my ability. They weren’t afraid to have me on the team,” Cinseruli said. “Those three guys stood up. They mean a lot to me.”
Despite all of the success Cinseruli had in breaking down the Little League barrier, she admitted it was hard to accept what she did. She wanted to focus on her current self, rather than be known as 10-year-old Janine.
“I was a pretty successful restaurant owner and I did really well. People would come up to me and say, ‘Hey, aren’t you the girl with Little League?’ and I would be like, ‘For God’s sake, I was 10.’ I wanted to be known for things I was doing now, not when I was 10,” Cinseruli said. “There were a couple of years when I would, kind of, shake my head and roll my eyes because I didn’t want to be 10-year-old Janine anymore.”
“However, now that I’m older, it is a big deal to me. It means a lot and it’s important. I just love the fact that we did that when we did it and it was the right time – and I’m really proud of it,” she added.
In addition to Cinseruli, Jenny Fulle of California, Amy Dickinson of New Jersey, Elizabeth Osder of New Jersey, Maria Pepe of New Jersey, and Kathryn Johnston of New York all played important roles in girls being allowed to play in Little League.
Earlier this month, ESPN did a feature on Cinseruli and company to mark the 50th anniversary of girls being allowed to play.
“ESPN called and asked me if I would like to do this, and I jumped at the opportunity. It was really cool. It was honestly nice to be recognized,” Cinseruli said. “It was nice to get that phone call and it was nice to be recognized. It’s humbling because, sometimes, I really don’t think of the scope of what it was and then something like that will happen and I’ll be like, ‘Hey, look at that. That was a pretty cool thing to do.’”
Link to ESPN segment: https://www.espn.com/video/clip/_/id/40801597
