Dolly Vardens was a recurring name used for a number of baseball teams throughout the United States in the early decades of baseball (1860s-1880s). Most were white, male squads, though there was an all-female, African-American team from Chester, Pennsylvania, assembled by barber-turned-sports entrepreneur John Lang in the 1880s."Baseball In Skirts, 19th-Century Style," NPR.org
According to 19th century reports, in May 1883 in Chester's Lamokin Woods, a team of Black female players led by shortstop Ella Harris played against an unnamed team in a contest that was considered "a failure."
Apparently, there were two different semi-professional Dolly Varden teams, and one of them played a third club known as "Captain Jinks" in a game declared a draw after 15 innings. A newspaper report of the game included a long description about the opening coin toss plus a "lengthy discussion about a player getting a thorn stuck in her foot after chasing a foul ball into the woods, but not a ton of attention was paid to the quality of play."
Overall, these teams of Black women players were considered to be only a novelty, rather than a competitive organization, who played for the entertainment of spectators.Thorn, John, "Strangest of All Baseball Attractions!," Our Game, MLB.com, May 2, 2016 (MLB official historian John Thorn notes, "Lang’s Dolly Vardens, created in the 1880s, are sometimes confused with several Philadelphia-area all-male clubs bearing that name as early as 1867.")Thorn, ibid.
The name was taken from a character in the 1841 novel Barnaby Rudge, by Charles Dickens. Dolly Varden is also the name of a Hell's Kitchen, NYC restaurant as well as the moniker of the last passenger train locomotive to run up Manhattan's West Side.
See also Women in baseball
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