Being champion is all well and good, but you can't eat a crown.

I don't want to be put on a pedestal. I just want to be reasonably successful and live a normal life with all the conveniences to make it so.

I was nervous and confident at the same, nervous about going out there in front of all those people, with so much at stake, and confident that I was going to go out there and win.

No matter what accomplishments you make, somebody helped you.

I think I've already got the main thing I've always wanted, which is to be somebody, to have an identify. I'm Althea Gibson, the tennis champion. I hope it makes me happy.

Shaking hands with the Queen of England was a long way from being forced to sit in the colored section of the bus going into downtown Wilmington, North Carolina.

Most of us who aspire to be tops in our fields don't really consider the amount of work required to stay tops.