Born in Waukegan, Illinois, Renae Youngberg grew up in the years before Little League Baseball allowed girls to play, and she had to play sandlot ball with the neighborhood kids. Youngberg attended Waukegan Township High School. There no were no sports available there for girls, but she was actively involved in intramural sports, playing basketball, field hockey, volleyball and softball. Outside of school, she played industrial league basketball, bowling and independent softball and baseball. Following her graduation, she earned a scholarship to attend Illinois State Normal University. Eventually, Youngberg became a member of the Junior Comets, a loosely organized collection of kids who were divided up into baseball and softball teams, each of which was coached by a AAGPBL player. The teams were allowed to use Simmons Field, home of the Kenosha Comets, where they used the field for practice when it was not otherwise in use. On the process, she was scouted by Mitch Skupien, a baseball coach at Chicago who later became an AAGPBL manager. Youngberg was vehemently recommended by Skupien and she had the opportunity to join the AAGPBL.
AAGPBL career
The Chicago Colleens and the Springfield Sallies joined the AAGPBL as expansion teams in 1948. Both teams were the worst of the league and lost their franchises by the end of that season. From 1949 through 1950, the Colleens and Sallies became rookie development teams that played exclusively exhibition games. At age 17, Youngberg joined the 1949 tour as third sacker for Springfield. During sixty-six days, she spent her time playing an itinerary of thirty-one tour cities. Youngberg did not play in 1950 because she had to spend six months in a sanatorium with a confirmed case of tuberculosis. She received permission to return to the league in 1951 and joined the roster of the Grand Rapids Chicks. She hit.201 with 26 runs and 31 RBI in a career-high 98 games. In 1952 Youngberg dropped to a.167 average in 86 games, but played solid defense at third while she was in the game. She split time with the South Bend Blue Sox and Muskegon Lassies in 1953, returning to the Chicks late in the year to be a part of the Championship team. That year, she finished with a combined.222 average in 72 games. Her best season at the plate came in 1954 with Grand Rapids, when she hit a career-high.270 average with eight home runs in 72 games, driving in 50 runs while scoring 50 times.
