Barbara Buttrick, 90 years old Englishwoman
and ground breaking pioneer in the sport of Women’s boxing, has been
elected to the initial class of the newly established International
Women's Boxing Hall of Fame. She will be inducted, along with six other
female honorees, at a ceremony on July 10 in Fort Lauderdale, FL, in
conjunction with a scheduled national Female Golden Gloves tournament. Buttrick, who founded the Women's International Boxing Foundation (WIBF)
in 1989, said from her home in Miami, Florida, 'I'm very excited and proud to
be chosen for the first class of this Hall of Fame, which, I believe,
going forward, will serve as a lasting recognition of the athletes and
others in the boxing community who have contributed to and supported the
sport of Women's boxing."
Buttrick enters the IWBHF as one of six former professional fighters
being inducted in the initial class: Christy Martin, Lucia Rijker,
Regina Halmich and Bonnie Canino from the "modern" era of the sport, the
decades of 1990s and 2000, along with Jo-Ann Hagen, a boxer who competed
professionally at the same time as Buttrick, in the 1950s. Christy
Halbert, the seventh inductee also spent, what she describes as a "short
career" as in the professional ring, but is being honored, primarily, as
a highly sought after boxing coach and for the pivotal role she played
in the successful effort to get the sport of female boxing included in
the 2012 Olympics.
While it took the London Daily Mirror 53 years to correct the
prejudicial diatribe leveled, in it's pages, at Buttrick, the
International Women's Boxing Hall of Fame got it right the first time.
Buttrick was an overwhelming choice for inclusion in the initial class
of the Hall. It was, in part, recognition of the many hurdles Buttrick
overcame in her quest toward the professional boxing ring.
