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Negro Leagues Women
Lesson Plan
(includes Student Handout
& Resources for Diverse
Learners Handouts)
Adobe PDF file:
Negro Leagues Women
Lesson Plan
(includes Student Handout
& Resources for Diverse
Learners Handouts)
Lesson Summary:
This lesson is designed to raise awareness of women's importance and contributions to society and to the preservation of history. Women played, coached watched, and supported the game of baseball.
Key Features of Powerful Teaching and Learning:
(National Council for the Social Studies. “A Vision of Powerful Teaching and Learning in the Social Studies: Building Social Understanding and Civic Efficacy.
http://www.socialstudies.org/positions/powerful/)
Meaningful: Emphasis on women involved in Black baseball in a segregated society.
Integrated: Promotes critical and creative thinking about African-American women and how they aided the image and development of baseball.
Value-Based: Will assist students in understanding the roles of African-Americans in America and also show students
that through perseverance and patience, these women succeeded.
Challenging: Students are given the opportunity to learn about Black female players, owners, and the women who supported Black baseball.
Active: Encourages students to seek an understanding of women involved in the baseball of the Negro Leagues.
Purpose/Rationale/Introduction:
This lesson is designed to raise awareness of women’s importance and contributions to society and to the preservation of history. Women played, coached watched, and supported the game of baseball.
Objectives:
1. Students will be able to examine what has been written about women’s involvement in the Negro Leagues.
2. Students will be able to determine the importance of these women to the social order and advancement of women in society and the world of sports.
3. Students will become familiar with the women who played, coached, and supported Black baseball.
Procedures and Activities:
This is designed as a two-day lesson used within the timeframe of the 1920's-1950’s. The information can be presented in a discussion format or lecture. The activities listed are ideas that can be used to enhance the lesson.
Lessson Plan:
A lesson about women and their impact on Negro League Baseball. This lesson is divided into three sections:
(1) Coaching and Managing
(2) Players
(3) Wives that supported the game
1. Coaches, Managers and Owners:
What challenges do you think a Black female manager would face during the segregation era?
Were there any women that owned baseball teams?
Effa Manley
Born: March 27, 1900
Died: April 16, 1981
In 1935, Abe Manley organized the Newark Eagles of the Negro Baseball Leagues. Abe’s wife Effa Manley was the general manager, book keeper and publicist for the team. Effa was credited with being a tough but fair manager who never shied away from crediting her players and her husband with their successes. Manley was known as a players' advocate. She fought for better schedules, better travel and better salaries. Manley recognized that her team was a community resource. Said former Eagles star Max Manning, "The Eagles were to (black) Newark what the Dodgers were to Brooklyn."
(McKissick, Pat, McKissick, Patricia, and McKissick, Fredrick L. Black Diamond: the Story of the Negro Baseball Leagues. New York: Scholastic Trade, 1998)
According to Monte Irvin, Manley provided the Eagles with an air-conditioned, $15,000 Flexible Clipper bus, a first for the Negro Leagues. Worried about what her players would do for employment during the off-season, she and Abe sponsored a team in the Puerto Rican winter leagues.
(http://www.nlbpa.com/manley_effa.html)
Effa’s life was even more complicated than most in the segregated world of the early 1900’s. Effa’s father was black and her mother was Scandinavian. Effa was born light-skinned, with which she easily could have passed for being white. She decided, however, to identify with the black part of her heritage, taking an active role in the Negro Leagues and civil rights causes of the time.
Manley was also a social activist. As part of her work for the Citizen’s League for Fair Play, Manley organized a 1934 boycott of a Harlem store that refused to hire black sales clerks. After six weeks, the owners of the store gave in, and a year later 300 stores on 125th Street employed blacks. Manley was the treasurer of the Newark chapter of the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP) and often used Eagles games to promote civic causes. In 1939, Manley held an "Anti-Lynching Day" at Ruppert Stadium.
(http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Effa_Manley)
After Jackie Robinson broke the color line in Major League baseball, many of the Negro League teams were raided for talent. Effa, seeming to have some foresight into what integration meant to the future of her league, fought to keep all her players, but just
couldn’t compete with the money and fame the Major Leagues offered. Don Newcombe, Larry Doby and Monte Irvin all left the Eagles for the majors while she was managing.
(McKissick, Pat, McKissick, Patricia, and McKissick, Fredrick L. Black Diamond: the Story of the Negro Baseball Leagues. New York: Scholastic Trade, 1998.)
Olivia Taylor
When the Indianapolis ABC’s manager C.I. Taylor passed away in February 1922, his wife, Olivia Taylor continued to run the
team for 3 years. She was not able to continue with the team because the creation of the Eastern Colored League in 1923 dealt a serious blow to the ABC’s (named for the “American Brewing Company of Indianapolis), who lost many players to the new circuit, and in 1924 the team was dropped from the Negro National League. After the season, Olivia Taylor, the first female owner of a Negro League team, sold the team to Warner Jewell.
(http://home.cinci.rr.com/debono/nine.htm)
2. Players:
What do you think these three female baseball players accomplished for the female players of today?
Do you think Black men accepted women as equals on the field, even though they themselves were discriminated against every day?
Why were women players originally signed to a “clown team”?
Why do you think it may have been easier to become a female baseball player on a pro team at a time when Blacks were fighting for civil rights and not allowed to play with the Major leaguers?
Marcenia Lyle Alberga, aka Toni Stone
Born: July 17, 1931
Died: Nov. 2, 1996
Marcenia Lyle Alberga, who played under the name Toni Stone, was the first woman of three to play in the Negro League. As a
teenager, she played with the local boy's teams in St. Paul, Minnesota. During World War II she moved to San Francisco, playing first with an American Legion team, and then with the San Francisco Sea Lions, a Black, semi-pro barnstorming team. She drove in two runs in her first time up at bat.
She didn't feel that the owner was paying her what they'd originally agreed on, so when the team played in New Orleans, she jumped ship and joined the Black Pelicans. From there she went to the New Orleans Creoles, part of the Negro League minors, where she made $300 a month in 1949.
The local press reported that she made several unassisted double plays, and batted .265. (Although the All American Girls Baseball League was active at the time, Toni Stone was not eligible to play. The AAGBL was a "white only" League, so Toni played on otherwise all-male teams. In 1953, Syd Pollack, owner of the Indianapolis Clowns, signed Toni to play second base, a position that had been recently vacated when Hank Aaron was signed by the Boston (soon to be Milwaukee) Braves. Toni became the first woman to play in the Negro Leagues. The Clowns had begun as a gimmick team, much like the Harlem Globetrotters, known as much for their showmanship as their playing. But by the 1950's they had toned down their antics and were playing straight baseball.
Although Pollack claimed he signed Toni Stone for her skill as a player, not as a publicity stunt, having her on the team didn't hurt revenues, which had been declining steadily since Jackie Robinson broke the color barrier in the Majors, and many young black players left the Negro Leagues. Stone recalls that most of the men shunned her and gave her a hard time because she was
a woman. She reflected that, "They didn't mean any harm and in their way they liked me. Just that I wasn't supposed to be there. They'd tell me to go home and fix my husband some biscuits or any d--- thing. Just get the h--- away from here."
The team publicized Toni Stone in interviews, on posters, and on the cover of the Clowns' program. And she got to play baseball, appearing in 50 games in 1953, and hitting .243. In 1954, Pollack sold her contract to the Kansas City Monarchs, an all-
star team that had won several pennants in the "Colored World Series" and for whom Jackie Robinson and Satchel Paige had
both played. When Stone left the Clowns, Pollack hired Connie Morgan to replace her at second base and signed a female pitcher, Mamie "Peanut" Johnson, as well.
She played the 1954 season for the Monarchs, but she could read the hand writing on the wall. The Negro Leagues were coming to an end, so she retired at the end of the season. She was inducted into the Women's Sports Hall of Fame in 1993. She is honored in two separate sections in the Baseball Hall of Fame in Cooperstown: the "Women in Baseball" exhibit, and the Negro Leagues section.
Toni Stone's most memorable baseball moment came when she played against the legendary Satchel Paige in 1953. "He was so good," she remembered, " that he'd ask batters where they wanted it, just so they'd have a chance. He'd ask , ‘You want it high? You want it low? You want it right in the middle? Just say.’ People still couldn't get a hit against him. So I get up there and he says, ‘Hey, T, how do you like it?’ And I said, ‘It doesn't matter just don't hurt me’. When he wound up - he had these big old feet - all you could see was his shoe. I stood there shaking, but I got a hit. Right out over second base. Happiest moment in my life.”
(http://www.nlbpa.com/stone__toni.html)
Connie Morgan
Born: Born Oct 17, 1935, Philadelphia, PA.
Died: Oct 14, 1996, Philadelphia, PA
Career: 1954-1955
Position: 2b
Bats: Right, Throws: Right
Height: 5’4”, Weight: 140
(Riley, James A., The Biographical Encyclopedia of the Negro Baseball Leagues. Carroll & Graf Publishers, 2002.)
Nineteen year old Connie Morgan played for two years, 1954-1955, for the Indianapolis Clowns, replacing Toni Stone at second base. Before that, she played for five years with the North Philadelphia Honey Drippers, an all-girl baseball team, batting .368.
(http://www.urbanhop.com/women-in-the-negro-leagues.
html)
Mamie “Peanut” Johnson
Born: Sept 27, 1935, Long Branch, N.J.
Career: 1954
Positions: P, UT
Team: Indianapolis Clowns
Bats: Right, Throws: Right
Height 5' 4'' Weight: 120
(Riley, James A., The Biographical Encyclopedia of the Negro Baseball Leagues. Carroll & Graf Publishers, 2002.)
Mamie Johnson, the daughter of Gentry Harrison and Della Belton Havelow, was born on September 27, 1935, in Ridgeway, South Carolina. When she was only seven years old, she would play baseball every day. When she left South Carolina to pursue her college education in 1943, she refused to let anyone or anything interfere with her love of playing baseball. She practiced while pursuing her studies at New York University.
At the time, amateur and professional baseball teams were segregated. When she was 17 years old, Ms. Johnson was rejected as a team member by the White Female Baseball League. This unfair treatment and prejudice became her own victory. She proclaimed, "If I had played with white girls, I would have been just another player, but now I am somebody who has done something that no other woman has done."
In 1953, Bish Tyson, a former player with the Negro League, observed Ms. Johnson practicing on a field in Washington, D.C. He was overwhelmed by her athletic abilities. He maintained that she was a great player and suggested that she play professional baseball. He introduced her to Bunny Downs, Manager of the Indianapolis Clowns. After one tryout, Mamie Johnson made the team.
While pitching her first game with the Clowns, a batter on the opposing team yelled to her, “What makes you think you can strike a batter out? Why, you aren't any larger than a peanut!" Mamie never said a word, but the batter soon found out what she could do! 1 - 2 - 3 - OUT! From that day, the 100 pound baseball player had the nickname "Peanut."
Mamie "Peanut"’ Johnson played professional baseball for three seasons, from 1953 to 1955, with the Indianapolis Clowns. During her tenure, she won 33 games and lost 8 games. Her batting average ranged from .262 to .284. Of this opportunity, she exclaimed, "Just to know that you were among some of the best male ball players that ever picked up the bat, made all of my baseball moments great moments."
After her baseball career ended, Ms. Johnson was a licensed nurse for thirty years. Currently, she manages the Negro Baseball League's Memorabilia Shop in Prince George's County, Maryland.
(http://www.nlbpa.com/johnson_mamie.html)
An oral history interview was conducted with Mrs. Johnson-Goodman by the Negro Leagues Baseball Museum in Kansas City, MO.
3. Wives:
What would be your feelings if you were the spouse of the Black baseball player? (Referring to the travel, segregation, prejudice, monetary support, etc.)
How did these women find ways to support their husbands with such busy schedules the men kept?
Rachel Robinson brings a different view.
Why is her view different then rest of the women interviewed?
Christine McCord
Christine McCord, the wife of a black baseball player of the 1950’s recalls her times adjusting to the travel, being home alone when her husband was on the road and trips to the ball park when her husband was in town. Butch McCord played two years for the Paris Lakers, Paris, Illinois. Christine talks about how much she had to learn about being the wife of a baseball player. “It started with preparing meals for not only Butch but any other players of color who came to town to play ball. This was necessary due to the fact that there were no restaurants, nor hotels that catered to persons of Afro-American descent.”
(http://www.truebaseball.com/cbglue.htm)
Rachel Robinson
Rachel Robinson’s interview from February 1997 give us some ideas about what it was like for her during the early years of following the man who broke the color line of baseball in 1945.
When Jackie started playing for the Brooklyn Dodgers, did you travel with him? How were you accepted by the other wives, players, and people you met?
“When Jack began with the Dodgers in 1947 - by the way, I never called him Jackie. The name didn't have the intimacy that calling him by his given name had. Anyway, in those days wives were not permitted to travel with the team. The teams were savingmoney, and the men had roommates."
"Typical of those days, in terms of women, we were given a "treat" by being allowed to travel with the team maybe once a year. Today, in contemporary times, wives get elaborate treatment. They not only travel but have suites, limos, etc. Do I sound jealous? The whole situation was different then. It was more like a plantation system.”
“Initially one or two wives attempted to make me feel more comfortable as we sat in a special section of the ballpark for wives. But I think that the tensions were as evident in the stands as they were on the field. I became particularly close to Joan
Hodges, the wife of Gil Hodges, Betty Erskine, the wife of Carl Erskine, and Pee Wee Reese's wife, Dotty, as well as the wives of the black players - Roy Campanella and Don Newcombe.”
(http://teacher.scholastic.com/researchtools/articlearchives/
honormlk/rachelinterview.htm)
The Negro Leagues Baseball Museum located in Kansas City, Missouri, has interviews with two wives of black players who
played in the Negro Leagues:
Georgia Dwight – spouse of Eddie Dwight, a black baseball player for the Kansas City Monarchs. At the time of the interview she was 94 years old. She talks about her relationship with her husband and the opportunities she had of attending baseball games when the team was in town. She makes comments about her husband barnstorming around the country so that he could play baseball.
Lousie Smith – spouse of Hilton Smith, a black baseball player for the Kansas City Monarchs. Smith is a member of the Major League Baseball Hall of Fame. At the time of the interview she was 90-years old. She is soft spoken and gentle. She has enjoyed life and talks with fondness about baseball and what it provided for her family. She watched baseball and did some traveling with the baseball team so as to watch her husband play. She also talks about her family’s relationships with the other players.
Conclusion:
This is a history of the women who, against the odds, made changes in a sport rife with discrimination and dominated by men. These women represent a class who dared to go where others would not and support, compete and achieve.
Extension and Enrichment:
Students could go to the Negro Baseball League Museum website
(http://www.nlbm.com/) and access the audio history files of women’s interviews. They could write up a summary of what they hear and provide that to the class.
Assessment:
Students will be asked to identify the importance of women in baseball. Is this a reflection of society? This question could be used within a section on the women’s movement and social changes. What is the impact and involvement of women to baseball during the time of the Negro Leagues?
Alternative Assessment:
Students could write a brief explanation of what it would have been like to be a woman playing or watching baseball during the years of the Negro Baseball Leagues. Responses should be about their abilities, feelings about the game, support and how society looked upon them.
Online Resources:
http://www.urbanhop.com/women-in-the-negro-
leagues.html
This site contains information about the three women that played baseball in the Negro baseball Leagues.
http://www.gnofn.org/~mmcgee/baseball/Tony_Stone.htm
This site is dedicated to Toni Stone and her contributions to baseball.
http://www.truebaseball.com/cbglue.htm
This site is a story written about the struggles that Christy McCord went through as a wife of a black baseball player in the Negro Leagues during the 1950’s.
http://www.truebaseball.com/cbcl.htm
This site contains information and the writings of Christy McCord, a wife of a Black baseball player in the Negro Leagues during the 1950’s.
http://teacher.scholastic.com/researchtools/articlearchives/
honormlk/rachelinterview.htm
This site contains information about Jackie Robinson and an interview with his wife Rachel.
http://www.nlbm.com
This is the official site for the Negro Baseball Leagues Museum in Kansas City, Kansas.
http://coe.k-state.edu/nlbm/treat1.html
This is a KSU site that contains some good information and a video interview with Georgia Dwight, wife of a Negro Baseball League player.
Secondary Resources:
James A. Riley, The Biographical Encyclopedia of the Negro Baseball Leagues.
Patricia C. McKissack & Fredrick McKissack, Jr., The Story of the Negro Baseball Leagues - Black Diamond, New York, Scholastic Inc., 1994.
Rachel Robinson, Jackie Robinson - An Intimate Portrait, New York, Harry N. Abrams, Inc. 1996.
Henry Metcalfe, A Game for All Races - An Illustrated History of the Negro Leagues, New York, Metro Books, Friedman/Fairfax Publishers, 2000.
James A. Riley, The Negro Leagues, Philadephia, Chelsea House Publishers, 1997.
Women and the Negro Baseball Leagues
Student Handout #1:
Vocabulary Words for this Lesson Plan
(You could use the Kathy Schrock site to turn this into a puzzle to assist with word identification and knowledge).
http://puzzlemaker.school.discovery.com/
Negro Baseball league
Effa Manley
Olivia Taylor
Marcenia Lyle Alberga - Toni Stone
Connie Morgan
Mamie “Peanut” Johnson
Christine McCord
Kansas City Monarchs
Indianapolis ABC’s
Indianapolis Clowns
Barnstorming
Rachel Robinson
Brooklyn Dodgers
Jackie Robinson
Women and the Negro Baseball Leagues
Student Handout #2:
Student Study Guide
See link at above left to download.
Resources for Diverse Learners #1:
Build a Raft
1. Pick one item from each list to build your own RAFT:
Role
Effa Manley
Olivia Taylor
Toni Stone
Mamie Johnson
Christine McCord
Rachel Robinson
Audience
Any of the women listed above
The readers of a local newspaper
The mother of any woman listed above
The fans of any woman listed above
Form
A letter
A poem
A newspaper article
A letter to the editor
Topic
What it’s like to be a woman in baseball
What it’s like to be a black woman in black baseball
Describe the most rewarding part of your job
The importance of your role as a woman in history
Just what in the world you think you are doing in a man’s game
2. Fill in the blanks with your choices:
Pretend you are ________ (role),
and write a __________ (form),
to __________ (audience),
about _________ (topic).
Resources for Diverse Learners #2:
Pre-Reading Article
Grade level 8.2 and lower level discussion questions
This lesson is about how women were involved with Negro League Baseball. There are three ways they were involved:
1. As coaches and managers
2. As players
3. As wives of players
Think about these questions while you read or listen to this article.
1. Coaches, Managers and Owners:
(a) During this time in history, blacks and whites were separated. What problems would a Black woman have if she was the manager of a baseball team? Write these problems down to use during the lecture and assessment activities.
(b) As you read or listen, write down the name of a woman who owned a team.
Part One: Coaches and Managers
In 1935, Abe Manley started a Negro League Baseball team named the Newark Eagles. His wife Effa Manley was the manager of the team. She was a tough manager. She said the team was successful because the players were good. Effa Manley’s father was black, and her mother was white. Effa’s skin was light, and even though she could have pretended to be white, she chose to be black. She was pretty and smart. She fought for the rights of blacks. She met her husband Abe at the 1932 World Series. He was a rich man who was involved in illegal business activities.
Effa managed the team, called plays and decided who played what position. She went on the road with them and was respected by the players. When the white professional baseball league began signing black players, Effa’s teams were raided for players. She lost three of her players to the major leagues. She was the only woman to manage a professional baseball team in the history of baseball.
Another important woman was Olivia Taylor. She took over the Indianapolis ABC's when her husband died. He was the manager and he passed away in 1922. Olivia ran the team for 3 years and was the first woman to own a Negro League team.
2. Players:
(c) Write down one thing these women players did to make it easier for women to play today.
(d) Black ball players were not treated as equals because they were Black. Do you think Black male players accepted women as equals on the field?
(e)
Why do you think women players first played for “clown teams”?
(f)
Make a short list of the women players.
Part Two: Players
Three women were players during the later years of the Negro Baseball Leagues.
Marcenia Lyle Alberga, who played under the name Toni Stone, was the first woman of the three to play in the league. She was born in 1931 in St. Paul, Minn. In 1949 she went barnstorming with a minor league team called the The Creoles. She then played for the Indianapolis Clowns in 1953 and the Kansas City Monarchs in 1954. With the Indianapolis Clowns, she played second base. Stone was not very big. She was 5 foot 7 and one-half inches tall and weighed 146 pounds. She was knocked down by pitchers, taken out on double plays by base runners, and generally treated the same as other ballplayers while on the ball field. She played four to six innings a game and had a good batting record.
The highlight of Stone’s career was in 1953 when she got a single off of famous player Satchel Paige during a game in Nebraska. “He threw that fastball and I just stood up there and hit it across second base,” she remembers with a chuckle. (no attribution) In 1993 she was inducted into the Women’s Sports Hall of Fame.
Nineteen year old Connie Morgan played for two years, 1954-1955, for the Indianapolis Clowns, taking Toni Stone’s place at second base. Before that, she played for five years with the North Philadelphia Honey Drippers, an all-girl baseball team. Morgan was 5 foot 4 inches tall, weighed 140 pounds and was born in 1935 in Philadelphia, Pa.
Mamie “Peanut” Johnson, was a utility player and pitcher, and played a single year for the Indianapolis Clowns in 1954. She was only 5 foot 4 inches tall and weighed 100 pounds. They called her “Peanut” because of her small size. Other players said she threw as hard as many pitchers who were men. Johnson studied medicine and engineering at New York University. She was born in 1932 in Long Branch, New Jersey.
An oral interview was conducted with Mrs. Maime “Peanut” Johnson-Goodman through the Negro League Baseball Museum. She was quite emotional in her response to the fact that she didn’t feel women received the respect they should after having been baseball players. She has continued to support the Negro Baseball Leagues memory. She is very proud of the accomplishments which she and the other two women who played in the Negro Baseball leagues made.
3. Wives:
(g) Imagine some of the difficulties a wife of a Black player might have if she traveled with the team. Write down 3 things that would have been hard.
(h) If the Black players were very busy, what kinds of things could their wives do to help them?
(i) Jackie Robinson was a famous man. How might his wife’s experience been different than that of other players’ wives?
Part Three: Wives
The Negro Baseball League Museum has recordings of interviews with wives of many of the players which can be listened to on the web site. Christine McCord, the wife of a black baseball player during the 1950’s, remembers her times dealing with the travel. She was left home alone when her husband was on the road. She made trips to the ball park when her husband was in town. Her husband, Butch McCord, played two years for the Paris Lakers, in Paris, Illinois. Christine talks about how much she had to learn about being the wife of a baseball player. She cooked meals for not only Butch but any other players of color who came to town to play ball. This was needed because there were no restaurants or hotels that would serve people who were black.
Rachel Robinson’s interview from February 1997 gives us some ideas about what it was like for her during the early years of following the man who broke the color line of baseball in 1945. She was Jackie Robinson’s wife. She was asked this question, “When Jackie started playing for the Brooklyn Dodgers, did you travel with him? How were you accepted by the other wives, players, and people you met?” And, her answer was, “When Jack began with the Dodgers in 1947, wives were not permitted to travel with the team. The teams were saving money, and the men had roommates.”
“Typical of those days, in terms of women, we were given a ‘treat’ by being allowed to travel with the team maybe once a year. Today, in contemporary times, wives get elaborate treatment. They not only travel but have suites, limos, etc. Do I sound jealous? The whole situation was different then. It was more like a plantation system.”
“Initially one or two wives attempted to make me feel more comfortable as we sat in a special section of the ballpark for wives. But I think that the tensions were as evident in the stands as they were on the field. I became particularly close to Joan Hodges, the wife of Gil Hodges, Betty Erskine, the wife of Carl Erskine, and Pee Wee Reese’s wife, Dotty, as well as the wives of the black players - Roy Campanella and Don Newcombe.”
The Negro Leagues Baseball Museum located in Kansas City, Missouri has interviews with two wives of black players who played in the Negro Leagues:
1. Georgia Dwight - wife of Eddie Dwight, a black baseball player for the Kansas City Monarchs. At the time of the interview she was 94 years old. She talks about her relationship with her husband and the opportunities she had of attending baseball game when the team was in town. She makes comments about her husband barnstorming around the country so that he could play baseball.
2. Louise Smith - spouse of Hilton Smith, black baseball player for the Kansas City Monarchs and major League Baseball Hall of Fame inductee. At the time of the interview she was 90 years old. She is soft spoken and gentle. She has enjoyed life and talks with fondness about baseball and what it provided for her family. She watched baseball and did some traveling with the baseball team, so as to watch her husband play. She also talks about her family’s relationships with the other players.
Conclusion:
This is a history of the women who, against the odds, made
changes in a sport rife with discrimination and dominated by men. These women represent a class who dared to go where
others would not and support, compete and achieve.