Courtesy of Ruth Harker
Harker at the 1985 Olympic Festival, where she was named most valuable player.
Ruth Harker didn’t play soccer until she was 14 years old. “I came from a single mom of four,” she says. “I didn’t really start playing soccer until I went into ninth grade because my mom didn’t have to pay for it.”
So she’d catch cabs to make practice, and when the coach realized that she lacked foot skills, he put her in goal. She took to it, landing her a summer spot training overseas in Sweden. By 1985, she was standing goal for the United States Women’s World Cup team—the first ever.
“A lot of people who know me don’t even know I played U.S. soccer,” she says with a laugh. “They’d say, ‘How do I not know that about you?’”
She’s played on the U.S. women’s team not once but twice, and in 1985, she was named the most valuable player at the U.S. Olympic Festival. An alum of the University of Missouri–St. Louis, Harker was inducted into the college’s soccer Hall of Fame in 2014. This month, she’ll be inducted into the St. Louis Soccer Hall of Fame.
Her résumé includes playing alongside such stars as Michele Akers and facing England in Italy as part of the U.S. Women’s National Team’s first international matches. But “being inducted into the Hall of Fame,” Harker admits, “I am a little shy about it.”
Having recently moved back to St. Louis, Harker considers the honor a homecoming gift of sorts. It's also given her an opportunity to reflect on her career.
“That one coach would put me in goal because I didn’t have any foot skills," she recalls. "It started that ripple effect, and there were people along the way who kept that ripple going.”
Now, she wants to give that push to other young athletes. “My job is now more important to give back to those who need it,” she says, mentioning a Chicago soccer player who had a brain tumor for whom Harker helped facilitate gifts (gloves and T-shirts) from the likes of Tim Howard, Hope Solo, and Pelé. She also sees the forthcoming MLS team as a potential outreach avenue.
She views St. Louis as a springboard for future athletes. “It has a fantastic rich history,” she says. “It needed a team here, and I love, love, love that Carolyn Kindle Betz saw that vision and was relentless in the pursuit.”
Harker hopes the MLS team can inspire kids who were like her. “Whenever you have a team, there are kids with hopes and dreams. They’ll support that team; they’ll go and watch. To me, nothing is better than seeing something that you have a dream to do.”
