Becca Stimson '77 speaks about the creation of the Rebecca Stimson Athletic Award. · College Archives: Women of Davidson

Title: Becca Stimson '77 speaks about the creation of the Rebecca Stimson Athletic Award.
Description: In this audio clip, Becca Stimson '77 speaks about the inception of the Rebecca Stimson athletic award and her initial mixed reaction to the award after first hearing about it at a tennis meet.
Date: 1977
Source: From the Davidson College Women's Oral History Project.
Transcription: "One of the biggest, obviously, one of the biggest surprises as it should have been was having this award given to me. And then named and kind of hearing the backdrop of, well, we have this Tommy Peters Award for now the best athlete on campus. Oh, well we're not an all -men institution anymore. So do we consider giving the Tommy Peters award to a woman, or do we create this sort of parallel award, which is- was the decision in the end. And so, the two funny parts of that is my dad was on campus with Tommy Peters. So, another sort of connection there. But the, the day the award was announced, like it was a, you know, it's a big deal. We're starting this new award, and then this is who got it. I wasn’t even on campus. So it was that convocation and that convocation my class was boycotting because the college had refused to hire a Jewish professor, and that's a long story that's now been written and documented fairly recently, I think. And so, my class boycotted. I mean, while with the tennis team, we're all somewhere else in North Carolina playing in the state tournament. So, the award’s being presented I'm obviously not there to receive it. So, at breakfast before one of our matches our tennis coach Pat Miller- we're sitting around the breakfast table and she's kind of like, oh, by the way, they're
giving this award today and they’re naming it for you. And we're like, "Oh, that's great." You know, it's kind of like now, it is, you know, it was a big deal. And here we are sitting at breakfast and I'm more worried about our tennis matches, than you know anything else. And so, it was just kind of a- it was a weird, weird thing."

Item sets: Women's Athletics

Site pages: Athletics

Media: Clip from "Interview with Becca Stimson '77, 2020 October 09." Women's Oral History Project.