"Equal" Awards

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Bo Schembechler to Don Canham, protesting varsity jacket equity

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John Orr to Don Canham, protesting varsity jacket equity

The passage of Title IX in 1972 altered the landscape of athletics at the University of Michigan. For the first time, women competed at the varsity level. This development aggravated Athletic Director Don Canham throughout the 70s and 80s, but it was the issue of how varsity women should be recognized that provoked the most indignation throughout the Athletic Department.

When Sheryl Szady joined the Board of Control of Intercollegiate Athletics athletic awards subcommittee in 1975, the focus of its work was reviewing the distribution of varsity ‘M’ jackets. Szady lobbied for women to receive the same ‘M’ jackets as men, which elicited vehement opposition. Outrage emanated from Bo Schembechler and John Orr, the coaches of the football and basketball programs, respectively. The two coaches petitioned Athletic Director Don Canham to stop Szady’s advocacy, reminding him that the block ‘M,’ “has stood for excellence of performance in men’s athletics for many, many years.”[1] Schembechler even threatened to change the varsity award for the football players if women were granted the same award as men.[2]

Letters of opposition also flowed into Canham’s office from the ‘M’ Club, an organization of men who had been awarded the varsity ‘M.’ “It would make the award worthless in my opinion,” wrote ‘M’ man William Mazer Jr.[3] These men found Canham inclined to agree with them. Carefully parsing the wording of Title IX, Canham speculated, “[I don’t think] separate awards would be viewed as discriminatory…I think if we did not have equal awards we would run that risk.”[4] Separate but equal awards became the proposition of the protesting men.

The Board in Control of Intercollegiate Athletics made plans to vote on the awards issue on June 10, 1975. While the men opposed to equal awards mounted an active campaign, Szady and her supporters in the athletic administration did not seek publicity on the issue.[5] However, two major events in the days leading up to the Board’s vote swayed the outcome in Szady’s favor. Six days prior to the vote, federal officials released Title IX guidelines, including the provision, “no person shall, on the basis of sex, be excluded from participation in, be denied the benefits of, be treated differently [in intercollegiate athletics].”[6] The night prior to the vote, legendary Detroit sportscaster Al Ackerman appeared on television, and threatened to never mention another Michigan score on his broadcast again if the University did agree to give women the same awards as men.[7]

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Women's and men's varsity jackets

The Board voted 14-1 majority in favor of awarding equal varsity jackets to men and women, and it seemed that women would receive the ‘M’. However, when the women’s jackets were issued, the women’s ‘M’, while similar in style, was smaller than the men’s, and produced a shade of orange rather than maize. Additionally, the jackets included cloth sleeves, rather than the leather sleeves of men’s jackets. Despite these obvious differences, the Athletic Department declared that these awards were “identical.”[8] The Department claimed that “individual athletes may specify…which size of block ‘M’ he or she prefers.”[9] But in practice, women continued to receive the smaller ‘M,’ without consideration of their preference.

Women continued to receive different varsity jackets throughout the 1970s and 1980s, but Sheryl Szady continued to pressure the Athletic Department for identical awards. Administrative changes provided an opportunity in this ongoing campaign for award equity—Canham retired in 1988, and his successor, Schembechler, retired in 1990. By 1992, the next Athletic Director, Jack Weidenbach, finally implemented identical varsity awards for men and women. In 2016, the Athletic Department retroactively awarded almost 900 women athletes from 1975-1992 the correct ‘M’ award.



[1] Bo Schembechler to Don Canham, 1 May 1975, Awards (Varsity “M”) 1970-1984, Box 1, Don Canham papers 1968-1988, University of Michigan Bentley Historical Library, Ann Arbor, MI.

[2] Ibid.

[3] William Mazer Jr. to ‘M’ Club, May 16, 1975, ‘M’ Award Controversy, Box 1, Women’s Athletics (University of Michigan) records: 1972-1990, University of Michigan Bentley Historical Library, Ann Arbor, MI.

[4] Don Canham to Henry Johnson, May 13, 1975, Awards (Varsity ‘M’), 1970-1984, Box 1, Don Canham Papers 1968-1988, University of Michigan Bentley Historical Library, Ann Arbor, MI.

[5] Szady, Sheryl, “The History of Intercollegiate Athletics for Women at the University of Michigan,” PhD diss, University of Michigan, 1987, 145-146.

[6] Ibid., 147.

[7] Ibid., 146.

[8] Roger Zatkoff to Marie Hartwig, October, 29 1975, Awards and Scholarships 1974-1988, Box 1, Women’s Athletics (University of Michigan) records: 1972-1990, University of Michigan Bentley Historical Library, Ann Arbor, MI.

[9] ‘M’ Award Controversy 1975, Box 1, Women’s Athletics (University of Michigan) records: 1972-1990, University of Michigan Bentley Historical Library, Ann Arbor, MI.