A look back: Former department head brought kinesiology, new opportunities for women to Purdue

Written by: Angie Klink, writer@angieklink.com 

Marguerite Clifton, 1971(Purdue University Archives and Special Collections)

Marguerite Clifton transformed Purdue University’s Department of Physical Education for Women by introducing kinesiology, the study of the anatomy in relation to movement. As head of the department, she established an undergraduate program in the study of human movement that was the first of its kind. Clifton would help change the face of physical education for women at Purdue and throughout the United States. 

A new kind of PE for women 

With degrees from the University of Redlands, University of Southern California and Stanford University, Professor Marguerite “Mickey” Clifton came to Purdue from the University of California in spring 1964. She was at the cusp of developing a new discipline for physical education (PE). Traditional PE taught women to play sports and to dance. Under Clifton’s watch, the emphasis at Purdue would be on research and the science of human movement, her specialty. 

The new curriculum taught how the body performs as well as why. Clifton hired eight new faculty members, most with extensive backgrounds in various phases of the science of body movement. In 1965, Clifton brought the revolutionary Professor Ruth B. Glassow to Purdue as a visiting professor. Glassow was a movement scientist and educator who was one of the nation’s first contemporary experts in kinesiology. To have Glassow teach and lecture at Purdue in 1965 was a major triumph that would lead eventually to the establishment of the Department of the Health and Kinesiology (HK) — although the term “kinesiology” would not be part of the department name until 1991.  

A human movement course for Purdue first-year women was first offered in fall 1966. Movement and sport science became an undergraduate major and a graduate program under Clifton’s leadership.   

Clifton was installed as an active fellow of the American Academy of Physical Education in March 1966. At the time, she was the only member of the university’s PE staff, male or female, who was a fellow of the academy. She was selected for her scholarly contributions to the literature of the field of physical education, leadership and eminence as a teacher and administrator. By then, Clifton had authored five textbooks, produced educational films on physical education and received several research grants. Now known as the National Academy of Kinesiology, there are two HK faculty members who are active fellows: Howard Zelaznik and Tim Gavin. 

She began the Development Movement Education (DME) program at Purdue with two other professors to study preschool children. With little precedence, the program focused on developmental levels of performance in perceptual processing and motor behavior exhibited by each child.  Although there had been studies of the relation of motor development to learning in children with learning disabilities, no one had yet studied “typical” children. In fact, no one in the United States had studied preschool children in the typical range. The DME program served as an intensive training ground for students in the physical education major and early childhood education major. 

Clifton subscribed to the theory that one cannot separate mind and body, and by 1972, she saw several movement issues for children. One was inactivity, which affected the entire learning process. Another was fear of failure, and yet another was the demands imposed by parents that caused a child to withdraw when the going got tough. 

Title IX Turns the Tide 

Marguerite Clifton was one of the first women to meet with the National Collegiate Athletic Association and participate in a study of women in intercollegiate sports. She presented a paper to the organization in 1964. The topic was “Extending the Horizons for Interscholastic Sports Competition.” She was also president of the Division of Girls’ and Women’s Sports of the American Association for Health, Physical Education and Recreation, and helped develop the first guidelines for intramural and intercollegiate competition for women. 

Title IX was signed into law in 1972, and Marguerite “Mickey” Clifton was at the helm as landmark changes evolved for women in physical education and athletics at Purdue. The Department of Physical Education for Women created a series of eleven different courses designed to prepare women to coach girls and women athletes. Clifton spoke out for intercollegiate sports opportunities for women. She blazed her own trail along the way, becoming the first woman to be appointed a member of Stanford University’s Athletic Board in 1973. 

Purdue’s men’s and women’s physical education departments consolidated in 1976. Marguerite Clifton, having lost her position as a department head, continued as a professor of physical education and conducted research in the new Department of Physical Education, Health and Recreation Studies. In 1978, she became president of the American Academy of Physical Education. Soon after, Clifton left Purdue and became department chair of Physical Education at California State University, Long Beach, where she was awarded professor emeritus status in 1987.