While North Side playgrounds in Minneapolis were magnets of athletic opportunities for young people, too often, some were relegated to the sideline. Especially female athletes.
That didn’t sit well with Kathie Eiland-Madison in the late 1960s. So, she made a stand. Rather, a sit-in to protest. She believed she was every bit as good as the boys at all sports, but at the time, females as athletes weren’t seen as much beyond the “tom-boy” tag. Eiland-Madison would show her disgust by not being selected to play in a pick-up game by sitting at midcourt. She’d refuse to move until someone took a chance on her or she had to be moved. Mind you, she was on the same court as neighborhood standouts Terry Lewis, Jimmy Jam and Jellybean Johnson. If those names sound familiar, you aren’t mistaken. All were bandmates in the Minneapolis-based group, The Time. Johnson, by the way, was the one typically in charge of lifting Eiland-Madison off the court and carrying her to the side.
