Black History Month--Remembering Althea Gibson

Though it was the graceful Australian Evonne Goolagong (herself a breaker of cultural barriers) who ultimately hooked me into a lifetime preoccupaton with women's tennis, my earliest tennis influence was Althea Gibson. Though I was a baby when Gibson made her breakthroughs at the U.S. Championships (now the U.S. Open) and Wimbledon, she was still winning grand slams when I was a little girl, and I saw her on television and read about her in magazines.

Gibson won 56 singles and doubles titles in the 1950's, including what we would now consider 11 Grand Slam titles, and was inducted into the Tennis Hall of Fame in 1971. She was the first African American woman to play in the U.S. Championships, the first to play in the French Open, and the first to play at Wimbledon. Gibson was also the first African American to be voted the Associated Press's Female Athlete of the Year. From 1975 to 1985, she was the New Jersey State Commissioner of Athletics. Off the court, Gibson was an accomplished golfer, musician, and singer.

In 1958, Althea Gibson wrote her autobiography, I Always Wanted To Be Somebody. She was. Gibson, who died in 2003, opened the door to everyone from Zina Garrison to the Williams sisters. The United States Tennis Association, in honor of Black History Month, has selected the Top 10 Moments In Black Tennis History. Not surprisingly, the Number One moment is Althea Gibson's appearance at the 1950 U.S. Championsips.