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Blackmon Conquers Adventures on Roads, Trails, Fields

Jan. 1, 2001 – Senior Softball-USA

Purcellville, VIRGINIA ˆ When Pat Blackmon was 60, she led a group of 17 senior women on a bicycle trip across the country, from San Diego to St. Augustine, Florida.

For seven weeks in 1998, she led these women along the roads of America and into the pages of history.

Then there were the two summers that Blackmon and her son walked the entire length of the Appalachian Trail.

Last year, she became the first woman inducted into the National Senior Softball Hall of Fame.

One can only wonder what the future holds for the woman who helped build the senior women's league in Northern Virginia from 16 players in 1990 to 177 today.

This year Pat Blackmon, 62, becomes SSWC's East Coast Women's Director and an inaugural member of the National Senior Softball Women's Advisory Council.

"We can not think of a better advocate for women senior softball players ˆ or the sport," said Terry Hennessy, SSWC executive director.

Blackmon was born and grew up in Yonkers, New York, in the 1940s and '50s. But home, for the better part of the past 40 years, has been Virginia.

"I left Yonkers to go to the Richmond Professional Institute, a branch of William and Mary College," said Blackmon. "I majored in psychology and social work, but never used it."

After college, Blackmon got married and spent some time exploring Puerto Rico with her husband. "We wanted to live on an island that was cheap and where the people didn't speak English," she said.

But Virginia beckoned and soon the couple moved back to settle down and raise their three children.

"I was always athletic and played some ball in high school, but I didn't really get serious about it until I was 32 or 33," said Blackmon. "I was watching men play softball and I wondered why there were no women's leagues."

Blackmon approached Arlington County officials in 1971 with the idea and they gave her the go-ahead to start a women's softball league.

"I knew I had to get serious about playing then," said Blackmon.

Blackmon played in the league for the next 17 years, until she turned 50.

That was the year the men's senior league in Northern Virginia, which was vary active, suggested that it was time to put together a women's team from the area to compete in Detroit and in the Senior Olympics.

"We put the team together, but most of us didn't know each other and some of the women had never played," said Blackmon. The women's senior league in Arlington County, which starts at age 40, grew from 16 players that first year to 177 players this season.

"We have league play among ourselves and we compete for spots on the competitive teams," she said.

Blackmon has pitched on the Golden Girls 50+ and 55+ competitive teams for 12 years, but the highlight was the Gold Medal the team won in the Senior Olympics in 1991.

"We put together a group of amateurs, but we worked so hard to become a team," she said.

"There were other teams with better players, but we were the best team. That was the most satisfying victory." Blackmon says she has seen women's senior softball change dramatically in the past decade.

"The quality of play has gotten better and better. The women coming in now have been playing continuously," she said. "Ten years ago, they hadn't played in 30 years. I was a rarity back then. Seniors are so much more active today."

Blackmon is still a rarity.

The bicycle touring company she started two years ago, called Senior Cycling, is booming, with Blackmon acting as the tour guide, teacher and mentor ˆ much the same as she has done on the softball field.

And this year the Hall of Famer will be on the diamonds again, playing for the Golden Girls 55+.