Eager to participate in competitive hard-ball baseball, many of softball playing women successfully made the move to emulate men playing in the major leagues. Womens Baseball History During World War II When these women soft-ballers heard of the new league being formed in the mid-west by Philip Wrigley and a group of investors, they came by the hundreds to tryout in 1943. The new womens league - the All-American Girls Professional Baseball League - featured many women stars from big-city and industrial softball leagues. A softball playing team, the Detroit Keller Girls, gained attention during the Wars years of the early-1940s.

Right-hander Connie Wisniewski with her blazing fastball thrown with a windmill-like underhand pitching motion. With speeds in the 90 mph/per/hour range, the teen-aged Wisniewski helped propel the Keller Girls into national prominence. Wisniewski, along with Lillian Jackson, Dottie Witse, Dorothy Kamenshek, Dorothy Sawyer, Ethel McCreary, Millie Warwick, Dottie Collins, Clara Cook, Mary Crews, Audrey Wagner, Jean Faut, Eileen Burmeister, Betsy Jochum, Gladys Davis, Dottie Key, Wilma Briggs, Carolyn Morris, Joanne Winter, Ana May Hutchison and Helen Callaghan opened quite a few eyes among baseball fans with their fielding, batting and pitching achievements during the 1940s. Terrie Davis hit red-hot .332 and won the batting title in the AAGPBL first season - 1943. One of the league's best hitters, Dorothy Kamenshek captured back-to-back batting titles with .316 in 1946 and .306 in 1947. Almost all of the above players got their start in amateur traveling softball leagues before vaulting into the professional AAGBL. Baseball Historian

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