The Cheerleader

{{Short description|1973 novel by Ruth Doan MacDougall}}

{{Use mdy dates|date=March 2025}}

{{infobox book |

| name = The Cheerleader

| title_orig =

| translator =

| image = The cheerleader cover.jpg

| caption =

| author = Ruth Doan MacDougall

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| country = United States

| language = English

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| publisher = Putnam

| release_date = 1974

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| pages = 288 pp

| isbn = 0-9663352-0-1

| dewey= 813/.54 21

| congress= PS3563.A292 C48 1998

| oclc= 39368608

| followed_by =

}}

The Cheerleader is a 1973 coming of age novel by Ruth Doan MacDougall.{{Cite web |last=Writer |first=CATHY MOLITORIS Staff |date=2008-08-14 |title=SUMMER READING: 'My Mother, the Cheerleader' |url=https://lancasteronline.com/lifestyle/summer-reading-my-mother-the-cheerleader/article_a73a13a9-8140-55af-a094-4fde07c6a444.html |access-date=2024-06-03 |website=LancasterOnline |language=en}}

Described on the author's website as "searchingly honest, achingly real, [recalling] all the joy, excitement, and pain of crossing the bridge from childhood to young womanhood in the Fabulous Fifties, when sex was still a mystery and goals were clearly defined--perhaps for the last time,"{{Cite web |last=MacDougall |first=Ruth Doan |title=The Cheerleader |url=https://www.ruthdoanmacdougall.com/tc/index.html |url-status=dead |archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20111004130256/http://www.ruthdoanmacdougall.com/tc/index.html |archive-date=2011-10-04 |access-date=2024-06-03}} it was first published in 1973 by Putnam and re-released in its 4th printing in 1998 by Frigate Books.

This is the first of five books in the "Snowy Series" ("Snowy: a sequel to The Cheerleader," "Henrietta Snow," "The Husband Bench, or Bev's Book," and "A Born Maniac, or Puddles Progress") following Snowy and "The Gang" as they continue through life.