Effa Manley Marquee Hall of Fame 2006

Effa Manley co-owned and ran the Newark Eagles, handling the work from contracts and payroll to travel and publicity. She never played professionally. Born in March 1897 and dead in April 1981, she was elected as an executive by the special Negro Leagues committee in 2006, becoming the Hall of Fame's only woman.

She and her husband Abe bought the Brooklyn Eagles in 1935 and moved them to Newark, and she ran the club: contracts, payroll, travel, publicity. Monte Irvin, Larry Doby and Don Newcombe all played for the Eagles under her. When Cleveland signed Doby in 1947 she insisted on being paid for his contract and was, which established that a Negro Leagues club's players were not simply there for the taking.

She used the ballpark for civil rights organizing and boycotts, and spent her later years arguing that the men she had employed belonged in the Hall of Fame. Seven Newark Eagles are now in it, and so is she.