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Abstract
Isabel ‘Lefty’ Alvarez was born in Havana, Cuba, in 1933. The youngest child and the only girl, Lefty was both pageant-level beautiful and all-star-status athletic. She struggled at school but thrived when playing baseball in the streets, where she was fiercely competitive. Lefty’s mother was very protective, but encouraged her daughter to leave Cuba at age 15 to play baseball in the United States. Lefty played five seasons in the All American Girls Professional Baseball League (AAGPBL), primarily as a pitcher. Lefty's story fits into many familiar narratives. Hers could be the story of a Cuban-American who proves herself through success on the playing field; or the story of a feminist hero, a woman who triumphs in a male-dominated world. She could be an impoverished immigrant who makes good through hard work and determination. None of these stories, however, limited as they are to the traditional lenses of gender, race and class, provides us with an image of Lefty that she would recognise. In order to more fully recognise Lefty, sport must be included in the discussion. By employing a new category of analysis I call sport identity, a more complete picture of Lefty emerges. Sport identity is not a category that has historically been used in social movements or that women have applied to themselves. It is an identity category that can be a category of analysis offering a new approach to thinking about the many intersections and layers that make up identity.
Acknowledgements
I would like to thank Lefty and the other ballplayers of the AAGPBL. Their stories, their courage and the openness with which they share their lives forever changed mine. A very special thanks to Greta Rensenbrink for her willingness to help excavate sport identity from the muddled mass of my sport-identified brain. With you all things are possible.
Notes
1. The phrase ‘A Useful Category of Historical Analysis’ comes from Joan Scott's 1987 article, ‘Gender: A Useful Category of Historical Analysis’. See Scott, ‘Gender’.
2. Throughout the article I will use ‘Lefty’ rather than Isabel. This is at Lefty's request. She believes that the nickname given to her by her team-mates refers to the person she really is, a former ballplayer. Interviews with Lefty were both verbal and via email. English is her second language and at times I changed the language to make it clearer, but never changed the meaning.
3. Anonymous interview with former player in the AAGPBL by author, 9 June 2008, Cape May, New Jersey, tape recording.
4. Cahn, introduction to Coming on Strong.
5. Escoffier, ‘Sexual Revolution and the Politics of Gay Identity’.
6. Crenshaw, ‘Mapping the Margins’.
7. Ibid.
8. Ibid.
9. Nash, ‘Re-Thinking Intersectionality’.
10. Scholars from many disciplines have used the concept of intersectionality and agree that it is a useful analytical tool, but many also seek to interrogate intersectionality and examine new ways of using it. Some of those scholars are: Leslie McCall, R.S. Chang and J.M. Culp, Patricia Hill Collins, and Jennifer Nash. While this list is not exhaustive, it does represent some of the important scholarship being done.
11. See Chang and Culp, ‘After Intersectionality’.
12. Isabel `Lefty' Alvarez, interview with author, June 2007, Grand Rapids, Michigan, tape recording.
13. Statistics about the importance of sport to the lives of women and girls can be found on the Women's Sports Foundation website. See http://www.womenssportsfounda tion.org/
14. Isabel ‘Lefty’ Alvarez, interview with author, June 2007, Grand Rapids, Michigan, tape recording.
15. Ibid.
16. Ibid.
17. Ibid.
18. Ibid.
19. Ibid.
20. Ibid.
21. Ibid.
22. Ibid.
23. Ibid.
24. Ibid.
25. Ibid.
26. Ibid.
27. Ibid.
28. Isabel, ‘Lefty’ Alvarez, interview with author, 14 October 2009, Palm Springs, California, tape recording..,
29. Ibid.
30. Ibid.
31. Ibid.
32. Ibid
33. Ibid.
34. Ibid.
35. Ibid.
36. Ibid.
37. Ibid.
38. Ibid.
39. Ibid.
40. Ibid.
41. Ibid.
42. Ibid.
43. Ibid.
44. Ibid.
45. See Baseball Hall of Fame Research Library, Cooperstown, NY.AAGPBL Collection. See also, Berlage, Women in Baseball; and Brown, A League of My Own. A board of trustees was formed which included Phillip K. Wrigley; Branch Rickey, Brooklyn Dodgers President and General Manager; Paul V. Harper, Chicago attorney and trustee for the University of Chicago and Chicago Cubs attorney; and Ken Sells, who was named president of the league.
46. Ibid.
47. Ibid.
48. Ibid.
49. Ibid.
50. All-American Girls Professional Baseball League Management Corporation, 'Femininity with Skill', AAGPBL Handbook. AAGBL Management Corp., 1945, A-AGPBL Files, National Baseball Hall of Fame Library.
51. By 1948 the league was so popular that the Springfield (Illinois) Sallies and the Chicago Colleens were created as part of a plan to form an International League of Girls Baseball, but that plan did not pan out so from 1949 the Colleens and Sallies became rookie training teams that played exhibition games and recruited new talent as they toured around the country.
52. Isabel ‘Lefty’ Alvarez, interview with author, June 2007, Grand Rapids, Michigan, tape recording.
53. Ibid.
54. Ibid.
55. Ibid.
56. Ibid.
57. Ibid.
58. Ibid.
59. Ibid.
60. Ibid.
61. Ibid.
62. Ibid.
63. Ibid
64. Ibid.
65. Ibid.
66. Isabel, ‘Lefty’ Alvarez, interview with author, 14 October 2009, Palm Springs, California, tape recording.
67. Ibid.
68. Ibid.
69. Ibid.
70. Ibid.
71. Ibid.
72. Ibid.
73. Ibid.
74. Ibid.
75. Ibid.
76. Ibid.
77. Ibid.
78. Isabel ‘Lefty’ Alvarez, interview with author, June 2007, Grand Rapids, Michigan, tape recording.
79. Ibid.
80. Ibid.