Dorothy Comiskey Rigney

Who was Dorothy Comiskey Rigney?

Dorothy Comiskey Rigney was the owner of the Chicago White Sox of the American League from 1956 through 1958. She is one of the few women to have served as principal owner of a Major League Baseball team. She was born in Chicago.

Rigney, wife of former White Sox pitcher and executive Johnny Rigney, was the eldest grandchild of Charles Comiskey and inherited control of the White Sox upon the death of her mother, Grace Comiskey.

For most of her tenure as owner, Dorothy was in a running battle for control of the team with her younger brother, Chuck, who was the team's second-largest stockholder. When Dorothy put the team on the market after the 1958 season, she initially wanted to sell it to her brother. However, Chuck made such a lowball offer that Dorothy instead sold the White Sox to Bill Veeck, ending the Comiskey family's 58-year control of the franchise.

She died at a Maywood, Illinois hospital in 1971 at the age of 54.