Decades before Title IX legislation was approved in 1972, businessman Connie Mack (C.M.) Olson provided an equal opportunity for women's basketball.

At the suggestion of his wife, Doyle, the All American Red Heads came into existence in 1936 in Cassville.

"Mr. Olson had his own professional men's team that traveled across the USA known as the Terrible Swedes," said Willa Faye Mason. "His wife had a beauty shop. She had several operators in the beauty shop, and they liked to play basketball. When they weren't at work, they were up at the gym in Cassville shooting baskets.

"One day she said to Mr. Olson, 'My girls sure like to play basketball. It's too bad they don't have a team.' He said, 'That's an excellent idea. I could field a team of girls.' And she said, 'You sure could, and call them Red Heads.' And he said 'All American Red Heads.' And that was the birth of the name."

The All American Red Heads, who played 50 years from 1936-86, were inducted into the Missouri Sports Hall of Fame last week in Springfield.

The Red Heads, playing in dyed red hair and red, white and blue uniforms, barnstormed the country with seven-player teams traveling in station wagons or limousines. Their popularity and success continued after Orwell Moore, an English teacher and girls basketball coach in Caraway, Arkansas, bought the team in 1955. The franchise grew to three traveling teams in the 1970s.

"We played the 6-player game three and three (offensive and defensive players on each half of the court) in high school," said Mason, who played for the Red Heads from 1949-56. "But with the Red Heads, they started in 1936 and they always played the five-player, full-court basketball.

"My heart is just full of memories of basketball with the Red Heads. The seven seasons I played, I played in every state but Maine. We played six months out of the year. We played every night, and we traveled in the daytime and played at night. You had to love the game."

Many of their games were fundraisers for organizations that booked them in the town the VFW, Lions Club, Kiwanis Cub to name a few. And not all the games were against women.

"People turned out to see the girls play against the guys, and it wasn't just women against men for a show," Mason said. "You saw basketball when you came out to see the Red Heads. We won around 70 percent, and we played about 180 games a season. Someone said to me one time the boys just let you win, and I said 'you're kidding.' The boys or the men did not just let us win. We worked for every basket we could get."

The Red Heads generally played two quarters of regular basketball and two quarters of basketball that resembled the Harlem Globetrotters, complete with fancy dribbling and trick shots. The organization was inducted into the Naismith Hall of Fame on Sept. 7, 2012.

After retiring from the Red Heads, "I always wanted to be a physical education teacher and a coach," Mason said. "I finished my degree and went on and coached basketball for 27 years at Northeastern State University in Tahlequah (Oklahoma). I achieved my doctor's degree while I was there. The Red Heads just really added a lot to my life."

Mason coached basketball at NSU from 1963-80, and she also coached tennis for nine seasons and softball for seven years. She was the first woman inducted into the NSU Athletics Hall of Fame.

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All American Red Heads inducted into Missouri Sports Hall of Fame - Joplin Globe