Claire Smith (journalist)
Claire Smith is an American sportswriter. She covered the New York Yankees from 1983 to 1987 as the first female Major League Baseball beat writer, working for the Hartford Courant. She later worked as a columnist for The New York Times from 1991 to 1998, and was an editor and columnist for The Philadelphia Inquirer from 1998 to 2007. She is currently a news editor for ESPN.
After the first game of the 1984 National League Championship Series against the Cubs in Wrigley Field, the San Diego Padres physically removed Smith from the visitors' clubhouse despite a National League rule requiring equal access to all properly accredited journalists during the playoffs. San Diego first baseman Steve Garvey left the clubhouse, told her she still had a job to do, and proceeded with an interview. Newly appointed Baseball Commissioner Peter Ueberroth declared a new rule the next day requiring equal access for all major league locker rooms.
Her mother Bernice was a chemist working for General Electric. Smith credits her for sparking her interest in baseball, especially for Jackie Robinson and the Dodgers. Her father, William, was an illustrator and sculptor. She was born in Langhorne, Pennsylvania and graduated from Neshaminy High School. She attended the Pennsylvania State University and then Temple University, getting her first journalism job with the Bucks County Courier.Honors
Claire Smith was elected the 2017 recipient of the J. G. Taylor Spink Award in balloting by the Baseball Writers' Association of America on December 6, 2016. She is the first woman, and fourth African-American, to receive this award, the BBWAA's highest honor, presented annually since 1962 for “meritorious contributions to baseball writing.” The award is permanently on view in the "Scribes & Mikemen" exhibit in the Library of the National Baseball Hall of Fame and Museum in Cooperstown, New York.
