HOF Assistant Curator spreads message of equality on and off the field

After 16 summers of playing baseball in primarily men’s leagues, Augustine, who was hired last year as the Hall of Fame’s assistant curator, is used to turning heads. The sport has accompanied her through high school, college, and employment – with one exception.

“When I moved to McAllen, Texas, there was no baseball league that I could find,” Augustine said. “It was 10 miles from the Mexico border. Everyone was more soccer oriented down there. I just kept up what I could by going to the gym, hitting up a batting cage and throwing a lacrosse ball against a brick wall. Whenever I was home, I would go to the field.”

Now playing in Cooperstown’s Leatherstocking Adult Baseball league, Augustine finds herself in a familiar role: The sole female player on the field.

“People like to ask me if it’s co-ed,” she joked. “I tell them, ‘I made it co-ed.’”

But luckily, she’s found that if you can prove you belong, prejudicial judgements quickly dissipate.

“Adults are much better behaved,” Augustine said. “Once they see I can throw and actually play the game.”

Such was the case yesterday at the Pittsfield Suns game against the Bristol Blues, two teams in the Futures Collegiate Baseball League. Augustine threw out the first pitch – with perfect form – prompting the home team’s manager to “jokingly” ask her to start the next game.

“She had spoken to teacher Andy Mickle’s fifth-grade class at Stearns Elementary School,” said Kristen Huss, GM of the Pittsfield Suns. “He was the one who had brought it to my attention. As soon as they told me about her and what she’s done, I really wanted to have her here. It was great for our players to see her, and for the kids to see her. Watching her on the mound, you should have seen the look in the dugout. Half the time the guests who throw first pitches don’t even throw from the mound, and she came out there and threw it right down the middle.”

According to Baseball For All, a non-profit dedicated to providing opportunities for girls and women to participate in the sport, more than 100,000 girls play youth baseball, but only 1,000 girls continue playing through high school. Through her time spent in the classroom and on the field, Augustine hopes to show young girls that they can stick with the sport – regardless of what social pressures or norms might be standing in the way.

“They’re right at that age to start getting that pressure to move to softball,” Augustine said. “I’m trying to tell them ‘You’re not the only girl out there, there have been women before you. You can keep going, you can still play.’”

Alex Coffey is the communications specialist for the National Baseball Hall of Fame