Althea Gibson was athletic from a young age. After first training in boxing and paddle ball, then running away from home at age 13 in favor of street fighting, she took up tennis reluctantly.
“I really wasn’t the tennis type,” she wrote. “I kept wanting to fight the other player.”
Regardless, she was a natural and, with her aggressive style, began winning tournaments.
Whites-only competitions refused her entry, and it’s clear why. Once they could no longer deny her skill, she became the first Black player to compete at Wimbledon – and she began to dominate.
Soon she won Wimbledon – and then the U.S. Open, two years back-to-back! She’d eventually be ranked #1 in the world.
"Ain't that a blip," she said later, "that a Harlem street rebel would go on to become a world tennis champion?"
Despite her achievements, Gibson made almost no money from tennis. She was nearly impoverished in her later years.
But the legacy she left is untouchable – and she eventually did get recognized.
In recent years, Serena Williams Naomi Osaka, and Coco Gauff all cited Gibson as their inspiration.
And though Althea Gibson never got those flowers during her life, in 2019 a statue was erected in her honor at the Arthur Ashe Stadium in New York, where the U.S. Open is played. It was about time!