BRYN MAWR, Pa. - For the conclusion of Women's History Month, The Bryn Mawr Athletics Department would like to highlight one of the most influential women in the department's history, Constance M.K. Applebee. Throughout her life, Applebee was a Bryn Mawr athletic director, coach, founder of the United States Field Hockey Association, female sports activist, International Women's Sports Hall of Fame inductee, and author. She was born by the name Katherine Mary on June 4, 1873, in Chigwell, Essex, England. While in her home country, she learned and taught the game of field hockey before coming to the United States to pursue an education in athletics and spread the sport worldwide.

In the United States, she embarked on a tour of the women's colleges in the Northeast to share the sport of field hockey. During her tour, Applebee visited Bryn Mawr College, where she would soon spend the next 25 years of her career, beginning in 1904. At Bryn Mawr, Applebee served as director of outdoor sports and was later asked to take over the physical education department. Prior to Applebee, athletics and team sports were separate from physical education and were controlled entirely by the students who did not understand the formal rules of the games. Applebee taught the students sportsmanship as well as the standardized rules to increase participation and advance gameplay.

She was said to believe that women's participation in sports contributed to their empowerment. In the Bryn Mawr Alumnae Bulletin from the summer of 1977, she is quoted as saying, "You want all these students to go out and do something in the world, to get the vote. What's the good of their having the vote if they're too ill to use it?" Applebee believed that every person should have the opportunity to participate in sports. With this philosophy, she went on to organize 50 teams to play interclass competitive basketball, and introduced field hockey, lacrosse, water polo, track, tennis, swimming, fencing, archery, and badminton to Bryn Mawr College. 

Applebee's activities on campus were not limited to athletics. She contributed to various aspects of May Day planning including costume design, supervising plays, training in traditional dances, and serving as festival director. Just three years after her joining the department, Applebee was said to convince the College's president to start a formal health department offering regular doctor's examinations and monitoring. In 1915, she assisted a group of students in their desire to create The College News where she served as faculty advisor for five years until the publication was firmly established. As demonstrated through her many instances of involvement throughout campus, Applebee was a constant and familiar face to students, athletes, and faculty and was affectionately referred to as "Apple".

Applebee was well known, respected, and admired around the world, and she was recognized as one of the most prominent female figures to introduce and promote the sport of women's field hockey in the United States. In 1922, she helped found the United States Field Hockey Association. Additionally, she was an editor and publisher of a magazine for women athletes, Sportswoman, for ten years. The U.S. Women's Lacrosse Association was established at Applebee's field hockey camp in the summer of 1931, demonstrating her involvement in the development of lacrosse as a women's activity in the United States. In 1991, Applebee was inducted into the International Women's Sports Hall of Fame because of her influence in the history of athletics. She did not retire until the age of 94, and she lived to 107.

Still to this day, Applebee has had a lasting impact on Bryn Mawr College. The Applebee field, named after her, are where soccer, field hockey, and lacrosse play in honor of the woman who made their existence at the College possible. The College Library also holds a catalogue of her personal belongings within their archives. The Bryn Mawr College Athletics Department are forever grateful for the tireless work and efforts of Constance M.K. Applebee and her legacy on women's sports.