Charlotte Armstrong was a pitcher for Phoenix’s A-1 Queens softball team in the 1940s. The Queens were one of the best girls softball teams in the U.S., and one of the prettiest. They were billed as “the world’s most beautiful team,” for their good looks and their feminine uniforms, which were designed by their own star pitcher, Charlotte Armstrong.

Charlotte’s family moved to Phoenix in 1926 when she was two years old. Shortly thereafter, her father died, and Charlotte and her mother moved in with the Liebers, a family that lived near the state Capitol building.

Charlotte loved playing outdoors, and admired the Lieber’s son Frank, who played baseball for the University of Arizona, and who would later play outfield for the New York Yankees. She discovered her strong pitching arm while shagging fly balls that Frank hit to the outfield during practice.

Charlotte also played baseball with the neighborhood kids. Every neighborhood had at least one team, and kids played until after dark. They made their own fields on vacant lots and utilized whatever they could find to build backstops and bases. One day, Charlotte’s team ran out of pitchers and reluctantly stuck her in. She took advantage of the chance and from then on was the team’s pitcher.

While Charlotte was still in high school, she pitched for the Queens (then the Cantaloupe Queens). However, in 1943, Phil Wrigley inaugurated the All American Girls’ Professional Baseball League (immortalized by the motion picture, “A League of Their Own”) and Charlotte joined the South Bend Blue Sox for $75 a week. She spent two years as one of the League’s best pitchers.

Charlotte then pitched for the Chicago Cardinals Girls’ Fast-Pitch softball team, which was owned by Charlie Bidwill. (Bidwill also owned Chicago’s football team, the Cardinals, which eventually moved to St. Louis and then to Phoenix.)

During her time there, Charlotte had the opportunity to pose for a photo layout that was slated to appear in the Chicago Tribune. As the photographers were finishing, news arrived that a notorious Chicago serial killer and child murderer, William Hierens, had been captured. The press frenzy for that story crowded her feature out of the paper.

In 1947, Charlotte returned to the Queens. That winter, she attended an ice show in Phoenix, and after seeing the ice skaters’ uniforms, decided the design would be perfect for women’s baseball uniforms. At the time, women’s uniforms were attractive enough, but were terrible from a player’s standpoint — too tight around the shoulders, too baggy at the hips.

Charlotte started stitching uniforms with side-slit skirts, tights underneath and a seamless raglan-sleeved top for freedom of motion.

Larry Walker, the Queens coach, took Charlotte’s designs to a sporting goods convention, where Wilson Sporting Goods Company accepted them and began manufacturing the uniforms. Unfortunately, Charlotte never got any money for her designs, but Wilson offered her a job designing uniforms. She declined because it would have meant giving up baseball and moving to the company’s plant in Tennessee.

The Queens were sponsored by A-1 Beer and often played against male teams in promotional exhibitions throughout Arizona. Since the Queens won about three-quarters of the games and everyone rooted for the girls, the men took unmerciful razzing.

Charlotte was known for her trick pitches and especially remembers one incident when she unintentionally threw a trick pitch.

The Queens were playing in Globe on a hot summer day, and their water bucket ran dry. Charlotte decided to cool-off by eating a Popsicle® between innings, but couldn’t get the sticky stuff off her hands before returning to the mound. She intended to throw a fastball, but it stuck to her fingers instead and flew high into the air, before coming down right over the plate.

The batter, who was a big man, twisted himself into coils waiting for the ball, then took a mighty cut, missed and went sprawling. Fifty years later, Charlotte still feels sorry for him, but also still laughs.

Charlotte continues to live in the Phoenix area. After 1952, she retired at the top of her game to go into business with Evelyn Haines. Together they ran the Paint Shop in Scottsdale until 1968, specializing in beautifying everyday objects like trashcans, wastebaskets and even Band-aids®. Charlotte was always artistic and today paints in oils for sale to private collectors.

—Gary Weiand. Photo courtesy Charlotte Armstrong.