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(CROWD CHEERING)

(CROWD APPLAUDING)

ART CARRINGTON: It was just an amazing day, an amazing day,

that Althea playing at Forest Hills and being the first black player,

being able to play, was major.

It was a beautiful sunny day, beautiful sunny day

and she walked on the court to play Louise Brough,

-who was the best player in the country at that time. -(CROWD CHEERING)

NARRATOR: Nearly 2,000 spectators jammed in the stands

and the Pinkertons had to close the gates.

Among the spectators were hecklers, shouting, "Beat the nigger."

Althea blocked them out.

"I was too arrogant and antisocial," Althea said,

"I was not conscious of the racial difference."

CARRINGTON: Althea won the first set, was up in the second set,

-and out of left field the sun and the blue sky turned black, -(THUNDER RUMBLING)

just as Althea was about to close the match up.

But there was no way she could've lost, none.

And in two seconds the rain came down like buckets.

BARRY MURTHA: And at that time one of the eagles

that adorns the top of this gorgeous stadium was knocked off.

I would've guessed it might've been lightning,

but it was certainly something that was, uh, tremendous in strength and power.

LESLIE ALLEN: When we walked up to the stadium, we saw this huge eagle

so I'm thinking, "Oh, my God! To be in this stadium,

"for the thunder and lightning to come,

"to strike one of these in such a way for it to tumble to the bottom,

"it was as if the Tennis Gods were like saying, 'Oh, no

"'this can't happen. We've got to do something to stop this match.'"

ALTHEA GIBSON: They tell me I was born on August 25, 1927,

in a small town in South Carolina called Silver.

My father, Dush, and my mother, Annie,

both lived in a little cabin on a cotton farm.

Daddy wouldn't have minded me being a tom boy at all.

He wanted a son so he always treated me like one.

Daddy always said,

"The big man, he buy the cotton,

"he gave you the lowest he could give you for it."

Daddy and my uncle only had five acres of land.

Even if things had gone well they couldn't have put anything by it.

"I worked three years for nothing," Daddy said.

I had to get out of there.

* Movin'

(ENGINE IDLING)

* Movin'

* Movin'

* Down

* The road

BOB DAVIS: Althea came down a hard road.

She was a street kid.

She lived in a depressed community.

She had a rough life and she was aggressive.

She was instinctively aggressive and I think that has a lot to do

with where she came from and how she got there.

If we are products of our own environment, then,

you know, Althea came to tennis an aggressive female

that had to learn how to survive.

Althea didn't go to school from the time she was 12 years old.

She went to high school from like 18 to 22,

and so that gap of years between 12 and 18,

Althea was pretty much, you know, moving around the streets.

LENNY SIMPSON: Her father really wanted a boy.

Every day he prepared her as a boy.

They would go up on the rooftop

and he would have her actually physically

fight against him.

He held nothing back.

Punishing each other.

Can you imagine some of the blows that she had to take

to prove to her father that she was tough enough?

It was just like she was fighting for her life.

He knew that if she could one day

take him that she was ready to take care of herself.

Playing the game of tennis against an opponent

across the net, hitting a fuzzy tennis ball,

that was like ice cream and cake.

GIBSON: Well, it was, uh, paddle tennis that started it all.

At that time my parents was living at 143rd Street

between Lennox and 7th Avenue,

and that happened to be one of the play streets,

and they had all types of games up and down the street.

Hoop basketball, marbles, loadies, and paddle tennis.

And that paddle tennis court was right in front

of my parent's stoop of that building.

One summer morning I came down and a friend of mine,

we hung out together, we played together, roamed the streets together,

we saw two bats and a ball on the paddle tennis court.

So we started hitting back-and-forth

and from that moment on

we would, uh, get up in the morning,

soon as they laid the court out, we were the first ones on,

we stayed on, and we challenge anybody on the block to play us.

Nobody would, so we were there. That's how I got started.

DAVIS: Oh, I think growing up in Harlem

really did help to develop Althea's aggressiveness,

because in street games

you stay on the field

when you win, you get off the field when you lose.

Who wants to sit down and watch?

Althea was the epitome of winning every time and at all cost.

Tennis is a game where you learn from the people around you.

But early on, Althea was her own girl.

GIBSON: I was introduced to the play street director named Buddy Walker

who happened to be a band leader

and plays tenor sax.

We had in those years a tennis club

called the Cosmopolitan Tennis Club.

That was the black elite tennis club in those years.

And he introduced me to the club.

BILL DAVIS: This was a private black club

that had five clay courts

and it was primarily, uh...

A club with, what we might call in those days,

the black bourgeoisie.

CARRINGTON: The educated African-American

mirrored his white counterpart.

So the black doctor wanted for his family the same kind of recreation,

the same kind of nice homes, the same kind of facilities

that the white doctor had.

Whatever he got exposed to, when he went back into his community,

he took that.

DAVIS: We got to see and rub shoulders with, and converse with,

people that were extremely well-educated people.

But these are the kind of people that began to have an influence on Althea

and to show her that there was another way,

that you could play a different kind of game,

and succeed at it.

But you had to play the game.

Well my style of play, I believe, was, uh, aggressive,

dynamic, and mean.

BILL: Althea was a rough type of person

when she first came out of Harlem and into the tennis environment

and probably didn't have some of the social graces

that they thought would be more amenable to being accepted.

One of my main mentors was named Hilton Davis

and he was telling me about how

when Althea lost to this Nana Vaughn

when they were juniors,

and he laughed in the stands,

she ran off the court and ran up in to the stands and beat up this man.

Althea was known to be tough.

You know, that's why she was kinda special to me,

because Althea, like myself, was urban...

And we carried the urbanness. We, we didn't hide it.

You know, I was proud of where I was from,

I was proud that I was a Northerner and I didn't want to hold my head down.

DAVIS: Growing up in the inner-city,

it is really a survival of the fittest in many ways.

Now, when you transition that over to tennis,

it's very alien to get into a competition with somebody.

Maybe get your brains beat out

and then walk up to the net,

quietly shake this opponent's hand and congratulate them

for having beat your brains out.

It's just not something that we instinctively wanted to do.

Those are the kinds of gentile skills

that one needed to learn

to become a tennis player

and those were the challenges that many of Althea's mentors,

like Sugar Ray, had to teach her.

Sugar Ray Robinson loved, believe it or not, he loved tennis

and he took a liking to Althea

and realized the potential that she had.

DR. HUBERT EATON JR.: She met Sugar Ray Robinson and he did a lot for her.

And, uh, Robinson put something in her head

that she could be another Sugar Ray Robinson,

so then she started believing again in herself.

BILL: We could immediately see she was a gifted athlete.

She was few years older than I was

and she started taking lessons from the same coach that I did.

A man by the name of Fred Johnson,

who ironically only had one hand

and one arm and he would hold the ball and the racket in the same arm.

GIBSON: And he took me on to teach me how to play lawn tennis.

He taught me the basics, the footwork,

the service motion.

I won the ATA girls singles championship

at the Cosmopolitan Tennis Club

through the tutelage of Fred Johnson at the time.

RADIO ANNOUNCER: Tennis today is packing them in courts

all across the 48 states.

This match between two queens of the courts,

Miss Peters of Tuskegee and Miss Althea Gibson of New York

draws a large crowd.

For tennis, it's said, holds a strange fascination over the people who watch it.

CARRINGTON: Through the time in our history in America

where African-Americans could not participate in organized major sports,

so what we did was form our own organizations.

We formed the American Tennis Association,

which was the first sports organization founded

by African-Americans in 1917

and it was pretty much, uh, a who's who

recreational circuit for the black intelligentsia.

Althea Gibson, she had a couple of people that really supported her

that she really liked, but overall this was not her world.

She had a lot of hostility towards the black middle class

who actually supported her

and a lot of the black middle class had hostility towards Althea

as a result of her attitude.

So she took to tennis, but she didn't want to take

the culture of the middle class.

All of the etiquette of the Cosmopolitan Tennis Club

was foreign to her,

but she really wanted to make a point that this wasn't my background.

GIBSON: I'm ashamed to say I was still living pretty wild.

I stopped going to school,

I was supposed to be looking for a job, but I didn't look very hard

because I was too busy playing tennis in the daytime

and having fun at night.

Some of the Cosmopolitan club folk who brought me out from New York

were pretty disappointed in me.

I remember one of them saying

they were through with me because they didn't think much of my attitude.

SIMPSON: I think the thing that she was very much lacking was,

knowing that someone really cared for her

and really wanted to help her succeed in life.

Dr. Hebert Eaton to me

was one of the two godfathers of black tennis.

LANGE JOHNSON: Back in 1946,

my grandfather approaches Althea with Dr. Hubert Eaton

and posed the question about whether she'd be interested in playing

the US National Championships, Forest Hills,

the mecca of American tennis and national championships.

And of course when she heard that she thought these guys are either,

uh, snake oil salesmen, (STAMMERS) or some kind of charlatans.

There's no way that that was going to be possible given the social backdrop

and landscape at the time.

EATON JR.: One or two of them, either Irwin or my father, said

we ought to try and do something to help this girl.

Young physicians, um,

who were really enthusiastic about tennis,

so they made some inquiries and found out this young lady

was about 18 to 19 years old

and hadn't been going to school.

They made her an offer saying,

"Now Althea, you've got a lot of talent,

"but in the world that we live in you can't really

"improve your game or move up until you get some education."

JOHNSON: So the master plan was to split time in North Carolina

during the winters, where Althea, with Dr. Hubert Eaton's family,

would work on getting her education and high school degree

and at the same time in the summers,

come to Lynchburg, Virginia and spend the entire summer

with my grandfather Dr. Johnson,

traveling and training on a daily basis with the rest of his charges

that were part of the elite junior development program that he was starting to form.

CARRINGTON: Blacks wanted to be represented in major league tennis.

When they saw Althea Gibson in the '40s,

they saw a Jackie Robinson.

JOHNSON: I think he saw the challenge in front of them.

"Why wasn't there more color in the game of tennis?"

Was really a question of access.

EATON JR.: He trained them every single day, you know,

drills, back hand, forehand, lot of balls.

They had to hit about 12,000 balls a day, you know,

hard as you can hit.

DAVIS: The best minority players in the country

were being brought into one location to hone our games.

So he arranged to bring us together and we traveled,

playing tournaments with one another.

We learned to get along and support one another

because we were a very select few people

that were allowed to go out and play in these tournaments.

(ENGINE STARTS)

We went to Ohio.

We were in a small town and we were staying in a YMCA

and they allowed us to play in the tournament,

to the chagrin of many of the players and their families.

We were asleep in the middle of the night and that fire axe came through the door.

I mean... (STUTTERS)

We jumped up and it was a frightening experience to see.

An axe through your door is a frightening thing.

And of course when we finally did open the door and nobody was there,

but there was a note that said that we should go home.

Which we did not do.

Dr. J was cool as he could ever be.

He said, "We know this was gonna happen,

"don't worry about it, you won't get hurt."

And we went on and played.

CARRINGTON: He promised our parents

that he would take care of us

and always our safety would come first.

EATON JR.: I don't know how much Althea knew about the South

before she came because the school systems were

totally segregated.

A real apartheid.

Althea came to Wilmington in September 1946.

She lived upstairs in our two story bungalow on Orange Street.

On the way home there was Brown's pool hall

'round the corner of 11th and Orange.

So she stopped in one day and started to shoot some pool.

And people, as they are in small towns,

noticed her and then got on the phone, call and said,

"Doc! Your girl out there playing pool in Brown's pool hall!"

So when she got home, my mother and father talked to her and said,

"Now in the South, now, ladies don't go in pool halls."

And that was the end of that.

CARRINGTON: Unless you really grew up in that kind of segregation,

it was kinda hard to enjoy being away for a summer of tennis

based out of Lynchburg, Virginia.

Just the name, Lynchburg, Virginia.

The only place we could play tennis was in the back yard

and when the top white players wanted to come and work out with us,

they had to come and play in the yard and we would have matches

sometimes that would take eight hours.

We start in the morning and one match after another

just play in the yard all day.

Dr. Johnson got permission for us to practice at a public school,

hard courts, 'cause we were going to the ATA nationals which was on hard courts

and so we got this permission

and I've never been called nigger so many times

till... In my life.

As when we were out at the courts and it was just like a powerless thing.

I was out there and the football team was practicing that day

and so as the football team was leaving the field,

they was like, "Look at those niggers play!

"Play, nigger! Look at... Where he learn how to play tennis like that, nigger?"

And it was just the most incredible

and so the Southern boys looked at me and Lenwood

and these guys was like, "All right,

"you know, the only thing you could do was get hurt down here."

DOUG SMITH: Dr. Johnson was a practicing physician

so he had to get to work every day,

but he would give us schedules, not only a practice schedule,

but also the chores that we had to do each day.

When we ate dinner he would give us our lessons in etiquette.

How to use your silverware,

how to scoop your soup away from you, those types of things.

CARRINGTON: The first time I sat down at the table to eat,

I took two biscuits and he really went into a thing.

"You don't take two biscuits here!

"And this is not... And you don't have to fight for food," and, you know,

and, uh, so etiquette was really, you know...

Dr. Johnson was a true pioneer.

DAVIS: We had our marching orders.

You go out there, you play the way you know how to play,

you question no calls,

you challenge nobody.

If you get a bad call, walk away.

And his idea was, if you question it

you will be perceived as the one that stopped everybody else

from being able to participate.

Pre-Martin Luther King, that was his Martin Luther King strategy

for, uh, getting us to be accepted to USTA tournaments.

There was a sense of pecking order,

it wasn't the sort of thing like,

"Okay, great, everybody did a good job today,

"everybody gets a badge."

It wasn't like today's society that if you'd show up you'd get a ribbon.

If you were gonna be one who was gonna travel

then you were gonna have to work your buns off,

you were not gonna be allowed to have any kind of attitude or be disgruntled,

or have...

You just weren't, you just had to be on your best behavior

I mean, and you knew it.

He was preparing you to deal in a world that didn't want you.

Because if you could survive at Dr. J's

then nobody else could come up with anything more difficult

and without really stressing, you know,

you can't go out there and act like this around those white folks,

that was never said, so it was more of how you're representing yourself.

DAVIS: I think what that brought to Althea was the first sense of discipline,

you can't do everything that you want to do when you wanna do it.

She recognized that this was something

that she absolutely wanted to do,

but knew, based on

dealing with Dr. Johnson and Dr. Eaton,

it wasn't gonna be her way or the highway, it was gonna be their way.

GIBSON: We had some good times making those summer tours.

I played in nine tournaments that first summer,

and won every one of them.

For whatever it was worth,

I was the best woman player in Negro tennis.

NICK BOLLETTIERI: Everything she did was with elegance.

Her movement was very, very graceful like a dancer,

but she was built to play tennis.

Long, lean, long legs...

That helps.

MURTHA: Althea was a most impressive

and imposing figure on the court.

She was tall. Willowy.

Very graceful.

The enormous wingspan.

You wonder how the hell anyone could ever get anything by.

BOLLETTIERI: She played the total game,

she covered the whole court,

she would come to the net, she could slice the ball.

I have here another picture of Althea serving

which is to me a classic because she's doing everything correctly.

She's reaching up for the ball,

she's looking at the ball as she hits it,

and, and everything is just perfect form.

I can remember,

after hitting with her one day at Dr. Eaton's.

She said, "You have a football, Lenny?"

I said, "Yes."

She said, "Go home and get your football."

This young lady threw that football at least 50 to 60 yards

right on the button,

could've been a quarterback on any NFL team.

I mean she could run, this woman could really run,

that's why she could serve and volley

and she had a good volley game.

The one thing Althea had was self confidence in her ability as an athlete.

And that came through loud and clear by her mannerisms,

her body language, what she said, how she said it.

She took no prisoners.

Everyone could feel her presence.

She had a stage presence.

You'd feel her, she'd walk in a room, you'd feel her.

It was very intimidating when she walked on the court,

her walk, her look.

She basically scared the hell out of a lot of the girls.

None of the women wanted to play her. (CHUCKLES)

And so she had that edge over them psychologically.

DAVIS: Often my coach would put me on the court with her

and the dominant thing that I remember about Althea is her

willingness to hit me with tennis balls.

If I came to the net to volley she would try to knock me down.

This was Althea's way of expressing her superiority to us.

She was the champion.

We were her hitting partners, and remember that.

Of course, in those years I was, uh, struggling to

become well known as the first black player,

to compete against world class champions.

SAVITT: It was the USTA, I don't know that a written rule or not,

I don't think that it was written, probably an unwritten rule.

And that just barred anybody of color from playing.

Everything was white,

the balls, the clothes, the people, the socks, the shoes, everything.

ARVELIA MYERS: Althea wanted to play there.

Just give me the stage and I will show you what I can do.

It's not about race.

(KEYS CLACKING)

ALICE MARBLE: On my current lecture tour,

the question I am most frequently expected to answer

is whether Althea Gibson will be permitted to play in the Nationals this year.

When I directed the question to a committee member of long standing,

his answer was in the negative,

Miss Gibson will not be permitted to play

and it will be the reluctant duty of the committee

to reject her entry at Forest Hills.

I think it's time we faced a few facts.

If tennis is a game for ladies and gentlemen,

it's also time we acted a little more like gentle people

and less like sanctimonious hypocrites.

We can accept the evasions, ignore the facts,

so no one will be honest enough to shoulder the responsibility

for Althea Gibson's probable exclusion from the Nationals.

Or we can face the issue squarely and honestly.

It so happens that I tan very heavily in the summer,

but I doubt that anyone ever question my right to play in the Nationals because of it.

It's just as ridiculous to reject Althea Gibson on the same basis,

-and that's the truth of it. -(CROWD CHEERING AND APPLAUDING)

DAVIS: I got the chance to go out to Forest Hills with Althea.

I warmed Althea up before she went out to play

and it was a remarkable experience.

It was the mecca of tennis and it was

something that was very alien to us.

People that have not been to Forest Hills don't understand

that it was in a community,

so you'd park in somebody's driveway

and they would charge you $5 to watch your car while you were in there.

And then you'd walk in.

BOLLETTIERI: And there was that club house, like a Tudor home in England,

sitting by itself and say, hey

to get in here you have to be somebody.

Even when the tournament was on,

to get in was a feat in itself.

And then to go up in the locker room to go to the bathroom,

holy mackerel, you know, that's... (STUTTERS) That was unbelievable.

DAVIS: The smell of the food as you walked in,

the people with the hats,

the players with the sunscreen,

things like we had never seen.

It's just so mind-blowing and intimidating.

There's no crowd like the New York crowd,

there ain't no crowd like the New York crowd

and there never will be, whether it's football,

basketball, the marathon, or tennis.

(CROWD CHEERING)

DAVIS: Once you walk into the stadium,

there's a new world that opens up to you.

SAVITT: The press coverage with the big cameramen all over the place,

and so they walked down the grand stand court next to the stadium.

MURTHA: It was a shame that it was in the grand stand,

because so many people weren't able to see her,

they were turned away,

but they were looking under the fences, under the wind screens,

climbing in the trees,

looking down on the court to get a glimpse of this, uh, wonderful young lady.

(CROWD CHEERING)

GIBSON: The first time I played at Forest Hills...

It was against,

I think it was the defending champion at the time, Louise Brough.

BOLLETTIERI: Louise always had a tendency to get nervous,

she had a bad service toss, and her forehand got a little shaky,

but for some reason she just felt extremely nervous,

it looked that way to me.

GIBSON: I was beating her, a set a piece,

and the third set,

I was leading,

and all of a sudden the clouds open up...

(THUNDER RUMBLING)

The sky got dark, as if they didn't want me to win this match,

and the rains came pouring down,

lightning came immediately and struck

the eagle on that corner of the stadium,

and tumble it down...

And they had to postpone the match.

I had to sleep on that, that overnight.

RADIO ANNOUNCER: And now the tennis world wonder.

Will young, unknown Althea oust the star?

All she needed was one game.

The pressure was too much for young Althea Gibson.

She lost her touch.

Miss Brough took full command.

MAN: Out!

RADIO ANNOUNCER: For Althea, it was a heartbreaking experience.

GIBSON: And the next day I came out. I didn't have nothing.

I lost all sting and she beat me.

NARRATOR: I have sat in on many dramatic moments in sports,

but few were more thrilling than Miss Gibson's performance

against Miss Brough,

because of the great tribe behind this lonely and nervous colored girl

and because of the manner in which the elements

robbed her of her great triumph.

(MARCHING BAND PLAYING)

ANGELA BUXTON: My first encounter with Althea

was at Queen's Club when I was still in my school uniform

with my straw boater hat and my satchel on my back.

She was playing on court nine near the gate,

so I sort of wheedled my way in and low and behold there she was,

serving and volleying, looking like a young man.

She hit the ball much harder than I had ever seen before.

She was coming off the court so I quickly produced a little notebook,

from my work satchel

and, uh, asked her to sign something for me.

She looked at me and I said,

"Um, I'd like to play like you one day,

"possibly win Wimbledon."

She said, "Not before I do." (CHUCKLES)

DONALD DELL: In those days it was a totally different tour than it is today.

It was in the clubs, you stayed in private housing,

you stayed with club members normally.

There was no money. You got your expenses if you were lucky,

and if you were a very good player you might make $200 a week

to cover your expenses.

BILLIE JEAN KING: We went to country clubs during the day.

It was a nice life. It was fun.

And you were never gonna get ahead financially.

You know they used to have a term called the, "tennis bum,"

we were kind of tennis bums.

We would just kind of live off rich people week to week

basically is what we were doing.

Well, you feel uncomfortable I can tell you, you don't know what to do

because you know these people are very wealthy

and they have a certain way of thinking about the world and a certain way

and you're kind of walking on egg shells the whole time,

I always was.

DELL: The clubs were very restrictive, I mean,

I would say 95% of the clubs that players played in had no black members,

and many cases they had no Jewish members,

and they would allow the week of the tournament

for Althea Gibson or, uh, Arthur Ashe to play

because they wanted to see the best players,

but certainly they couldn't have become members.

MYERS: As far as Althea was concerned,

it was not about

representing the race.

KING: Arthur and I used our tennis as a platform.

That's not what she wanted, she just wanted to play,

just let me be one of you,

and unfortunately in the '50s it just wasn't that easy.

It's just not gonna be like that.

BUXTON: They sent them to the far east

to do clinics and to play tournaments,

the motives behind the state department tour

in the 1950s was to try and impress

on the wider world at large,

particularly the black communities over there,

that tennis was a good sport to play

for blacks and for whites

and blondes and you could have fun whatever color you were

or whatever background you came from.

She was sent with a girl called Karol Fageros

from Coral Gables, Miami,

who was very pretty, um,

and they selected her particularly because she was a good tennis player

and good looking as well.

And here was Althea in contrast,

black, also a good tennis player.

I was sent there, too

by the British Lawn Tennis Association.

So I chummed up with the American girls,

and I became very friendly with Althea and Karol.

Their flight ticket was a return ticket to the United States,

at the end of the month.

And, uh, Karol went home,

but Althea talked to me about the possibility of staying on

and she asked me could she last out

to play all the tournaments between January and July,

which was Wimbledon on the money.

And I said to her, "Well, I think you could.

"And if you don't, you've always got your return ticket to use,

"you can go back again.

"I'll see you in Paris,"

'cause the Paris Indoor was coming up in February,

and I said, "If you like," I said, "we'll play doubles together,"

and she said, "Yes, okay, let's do that."

She was a curiosity and most tournament organizers

wanted her because she was an attraction.

People had never seen a black player before

and they didn't know black people could play tennis.

And so they were prepared

to pay her expenses,

so she had a little money.

She was learning to be professional, she was learning

to look after her body because if she became sick

she was out on a tangent,

she couldn't last, you see, she needed the money every week.

She became very meticulous with what she ate,

uh, the times she went to bed,

times she got up in the morning, the rest,

the practice, everything. She was much, much more professional

during that six months. It made her, really,

because she felt not only that she had to keep well but she had to win as well.

CARRINGTON: So this is a picture of the finalists at the 1920

ATA championship in New York.

On the left here is B. M. Clark

and he came from Jamaica,

and on the right is Tally Holmes, who was the current champ

from Washington, D.C.

Tally Holmes, by the way, was a Dartmouth graduate

in maybe 1916, 1917,

and B. M. Clark was the first, um,

black man to play in Wimbledon.

He played Wimbledon in 1924. Like I said, he was Jamaican

so you could see that the ATA was an international tournament.

It wasn't just African-Americans in the North,

it was a tremendous influence on Northern tennis

from the West Indian community because they had tennis in Jamaica,

they had tennis in Trinidad, they had tennis in the Caribbean

islands where these people came from.

You really don't know black tennis

if you don't know who Sydney Llewellyn was

because he was black tennis in the New York, New Jersey area in the '50s.

He was a dominant personality. He was very flamboyant.

Sydney Llewellyn was a Jamaican.

He came to America at 18 years old.

The first time I saw him, he pulled up,

he was wearing a safari hat with a safari jacket,

he was New York all the way.

He came to America to be a professional dancer.

He said, "I'm a Mac Man." He was the first one to use the word pimp

and not meaning prostitutes

but charisma, character, style,

you know what I'm saying, in the black language.

He helped Althea develop the self-confidence

that allowed her to be a champ.

He wasn't her initial coach, Fred Johnson was that.

Dr. Johnston, Dr. Eaton, these guys helped her in the ATA,

but she didn't win any titles until she was with Sydney Llewellyn

because Sydney Llewellyn was the mental man.

He, you know... He worked from a mind game

and so he helped Althea tremendously mentally.

(RADIO ANNOUNCER SPEAKING IN FRENCH)

COMMENTATOR: Once a year, the world's best tennis players

come to Wimbledon

for the all-England championship,

the unofficial equivalent of the World Championship.

Favored to win the women's singles in 1957

is Althea Gibson from New York, USA.

But there may be an upset.

Her opponent for the semifinal

is a 16-year-old British girl, Christine Truman.

The young blonde prodigy who has crowned several of the top seeded stars.

For Althea Gibson this is a crucial match

in her 10-year-long effort to become the world's best tennis player.

Althea has a big, powerful game.

She overwhelms the British girl.

The score? 6-1, 6-1.

The great task is still to come.

Queen Elizabeth of England is among the spectators at the Final.

Here, Althea Gibson faces Darlene Hard,

a fellow American from California.

Even Miss Hard applauds.

Althea is in top condition.

Match point!

And it's all over. 6-3, 6-2.

Darlene is a good loser.

Queen Elizabeth walks onto the center court to present the trophy.

This is Althea Gibson's reward for many years of effort.

It's a moment crowded with memories.

HULAN E. JACK: The young woman we are honoring today

truly deserves our tribute.

She is a product of our city.

She came up the hard way

and now stands at the top of her class.

She reached the top

not only because of her natural athletic ability

but because of her unwavering courage

and determination to be a champion.

Well, Althea, how do you feel about your victory at Wimbledon?

Well, I feel quite elated and quite happy about it, of course.

It was, uh, well, it was a good thing.

I went over there to win Wimbledon and I succeeded.

Althea! Althea, when you left for Wimbledon two weeks ago,

I understand from Buddy Walker

that he and two others were the only people to see you off.

Is there a big change in the situation two weeks later?

Well, yes! A great big change.

JACK: Althea, you're a champion

in a world of champions.

What you have done has added strength

and meaning to the Star Spangled Banner

and is as truly American as the Stars and Stripes.

How you reached that goal

is an inspiration to all Americans.

What you came through to sit here today,

honored by your fellow citizens

of all races, creeds, color and religion is ample proof

that in our democracy we take the leadership

in emphasizing human achievements

as we move ever forward

in our vigorous crusade,

toward full equal opportunity.

(APPLAUSE)

Will you come in, Mr. Challenger, and sign in please.

(CROWD APPLAUDS)

DALY: You can ask one question at a time,

in turn, moving clockwise,

and let's begin with Dorothy Kilgallen.

Are you in anything other than the motion picture industry?

(MIMICKING DIFFERENT VOICE) Yes.

And are you principally a movie star?

-No. -Well, are you in the theater?

-No. -Two down, and eight to go, Mr. Cerf.

Would you say that your field is athletics of any kind?

-Yes. -Miss Kilgallen?

KILGALLEN: Uh, have you been to England within the last few weeks?

-Yes. -DALY: Miss Frances?

Well, are you our, practically our best tennis player,

Miss Althea Gibson?

-DALY: Yes! (LAUGHS) -(CROWD APPLAUDS)

COMMENTATOR: In 1957, she meets Louise Brough

for the US Championship,

the same Louise Brough who had dealt her that heartbreaking defeat

seven years earlier.

(CROWD CHEERING)

(CROWD CHEERS)

COMMENTATOR: The US title, which has eluded her all these years

is what she's after now with all her might.

She is relaxed and confident.

This time she's sure of herself.

(CROWD CHEERING)

(CROWD EXCLAIMS)

COMMENTATOR: Louise Brough, great player though she is,

cannot stop her this time.

At the end, the score stands, 6-3, 6-2

and Althea Gibson is the new champion of the United States.

(CROWD APPLAUDS)

She stands in the big stadium in her hour of triumph.

The long years of struggle are forgotten in the ovation,

the tribute to her fellow countrymen as they rise for her.

-(BAND PLAYING) -(CROWD CHEERING)

COMMENTATOR: As the Vice President of the United States

presents her with the trophy.

It's a dream come true for Althea Gibson,

tennis champion.

(BAND CONTINUES PLAYING)

CARRINGTON: After she won, Sydney Llewellyn told her, "Okay, you did it once,

"now show 'em that it wasn't a fluke. Go back and do it again."

(CROWD CHEERING)

The Wimbledon ball was full evening dress,

and it was by invitation mainly

and it was like Hollywood.

The photographers,

they were all on the sidewalk

as the players stepped out of the taxis to go into the hotel,

and they would be identified, whispers, you know,

that's Althea Gibson over there.

The evening of the ball was a very joyous occasion.

It was a part of the ceremony

that the women's winner would open the dancing with the men's winner.

I just put a good word in

to the band, actually, as whether they would

entertain the fact, um, of Althea

singing a song or two with them.

And they said, "Certainly, with the greatest of pleasure."

She brought the house down, of course, 'cause no one

really was expecting her to sing.

In fact, I think she sang, um,

(SING-SONG) "I can't give you anything but love, baby."

I think that's the song she sang.

* I can't give you anything but love, baby *

COMMENTATOR: It's now point set for the match and title.

(CROWD CHEERING)

COMMENTATOR: Althea Gibson is still women's world champion.

Good evening, Althea.

-Good evening, Mr. Sullivan, how are you? -Fine.

Well, with all the matches you've won,

you could probably use a second apartment

just to display the trophies, couldn't you?

-My goodness, yes. -(ED SULLIVAN LAUGHS)

There's the French trophy over here

that I won in Paris, France.

Isn't it a beautiful little thing?

SULLIVAN: Lovely. GIBSON: It's very dainty.

SULLIVAN: Very nice. Is that a Hi-Fi set there?

Yes it is, Ed. This is one of my great treasures

and joy when I'm around the house

and listening to the wonderful music

and also Ed, this is my first album.

As a matter of fact would you like to hear one of the selections?

-Very much. -Wonderful.

I think you will like it.

It's Around the World.

* Around the world

* I search for you

GIBSON: Naturally, I'm always glad when something I do

turns out to be helpful to all Negroes

or for that matter, to all Americans

or maybe only to all tennis players.

But I don't consciously beat the drum for any cause

not even the cause of the Negro of the United States.

Althea Gibson was our Jackie Robinson,

so this wasn't just tennis, this was a woman

that was really held in high esteem.

CARRINGTON: She was pressured to be more outspoken

but she wanted to be

a person who did it through her racket.

BOLLETTIERI: And she felt showing people

what a person from the ghetto

could accomplish was more than

just talking in front of a group.

EATON JR.: She never got into it like Jackie Robinson did.

So they all... Black people had no use for her

in a way at that time.

Not helping out, you know, she should have been down there to fight

'cause she's a celebrity.

She didn't make any speeches or nothin'.

BOBBY SCHIFFMAN: People will look at a star baseball player

and listen to what he says about politics.

He doesn't know the first damn thing about politics

but because he's a hero

and because he's a major figure, his opinion means something.

Well, for that reason I think that,

that any reluctance on the part

of... (CLEARS THROAT) A performer or an athlete to get into the fray

when it comes to the betterment of the conditions

of their people was ill-advised.

They should have done it right from the beginning.

BILL: I guess, we was too absorbed

in ourselves. (LAUGHS)

I don't think she really felt her denials

or hardships were a Civil Rights thing.

REPORTER: Althea, uh, did you find in,

in that getting to the top of the tennis world

that you had any real great obstacles

because of your race or did you find it

a surprisingly easy road?

No, I don't think that there are any obstacles

as far as race is concerned.

BUXTON: I was born into a Jewish family in England.

During the war, when I was a small child in South Africa,

as an evacuee, we lived in Cape Town

and we shared

a sort of communal patio, right at the foot of the mountain

on the back door and this little black girl

who was the same age as myself, pretty little girl,

used to come out after school and play and so did I.

We developed a friendship.

And a friend of my mother's said, "I would stop that friendship

"right away if I were you.

"It's not right in this country for white people to befriend black people."

And I was stopped seeing her.

And I never really understood, neither, my mother didn't either,

but we were in a way, there in South Africa

um, by the kind permission of the South African government,

we didn't want to upset the apple cart in any way at all,

'cause they might ask us to go home.

So she agreed, but we never really understood it,

because she thought, um, and I thought because she thought,

that they were just the same as us, what was the matter with that?

And I never met any other black people until I met Althea.

With Althea,

I found a kindred spirit, one could say.

We were like soulmates.

ANNOUNCER: One favorite who'll be missed on the courts this year

is Britain's Angela Buxton who has injured her wrist

but will be seeing American champion Althea Gibson

and Angela has designed an outfit especially for Althea.

She's joined a London sportswear firm as a designer

and this is one of her models.

BUXTON: By this time, I was already number one in the game, in England

and I went up for the Easter tournament

and asked them if I could...

If they could supply somebody for me to hit with and I never heard.

And eventually the journalist from the South Ports Visitor,

he said, "They had a meeting about you

"and they decided no Jews at this club

"and therefore they would not allow you to practice there."

In Althea's company

I never felt anything like that at all

which I did with the other girls.

People reacted to Althea

in Great Britain in a shocked sort of way.

They didn't say very much because we're not...

Um, very talkative about these things.

We tend to keep them to ourselves.

But, um, black people

weren't really accepted.

We didn't have a lot in England, actually,

so again this aroused even more curiosity.

When she did come to stay with me

there were a few raised eyebrows in the block of flats

and I was asked how long she was staying

'cause one or two of the unit owners

had noticed her

and wanted to know whether she had moved in, actually.

Um, but, um,

I didn't give a damn, actually.

We heard a knock on door

and I opened the door in my flat

and there was this black guy standing there.

Handsome, in uniform, a major.

A little mustache. Ah, what a good looking guy he was.

"Is Althea Gibson here?" I said, "Yes."

So he... "Come on in, are you a friend of hers?"

And he said, yes, and it was an old relationship

and they got cracking and I gave them the bedroom and I moved out.

And they were there for two days.

I was putting trays of food outside,

so they could eat at least in between,

uh... Oh, yes, she had a thoroughly good time.

Bill Darben was the love of Althea's life.

Her first husband.

SANDRA TERRY: My Uncle William was always

more of a quiet, intellectual type.

So I think it was for her a kind of a respite away from

being competitive and the more athletic type of pursuits.

It takes a special man

to be able to be secondary in the relationship.

He not only had Althea, but he had her fans,

he had the publicity

and I think on a couple of occasions, he was called Mr. Gibson

and he didn't appreciate it at all.

SMITH: She won Wimbeldon and the US Open

both in '57 and '58.

Then she had to quit and she had to quit because

she didn't have a job.

BUXTON: Bottom line was we lived in an era

where there was no money in tennis.

Tennis was from the gentile

part of the society

of which she was not one.

SMITH: She had stopped playing tennis during that time when she was

clearly the best player in the world.

"You can't eat a crown, so I gotta make a living."

GIBSON: * Because of you

* My life is now worthwhile

* And I can smile

* Because

* Of you

ANNOUNCER: Good evening, ladies and gentlemen, your Mercury dealer

and your Lincoln dealer present The Ed Sullivan Show!

(APPLAUSE)

* Though life seems dreary and blue

* You know there's someone

* Who cares for you

* Though the heart of man be gone

* The soul will carry on

REPORTER: Have you thought about turning professional?

Well, I'll tell ya, I don't talk about the professional tennis,

it's a bad omen.

(STAMMERS) 'Cause when you talk, uh, some people

get the idea that when you talk about professional tennis

they feel that you might uh, be professional or you might do this

and, uh, so to avoid all of those criticisms

I don't talk about professional tennis.

KING: Particularly men would either go be a contract pro

and keep playing tennis and make money

or they'd go into some field of business like finance

'cause they had good connections,

the Ol' Boy Network really helped the men.

We did not have that.

DELL: If Althea was playing today,

she would probably be earning close to 10 million dollars

pretty easily.

If you flip it back into the '50s when she was playing,

if she cleared $200 a week she was doing great.

If she paid her coach or if she had a friend

or a husband or whoever

that was traveling with her and she paid any of that, she lost money.

See, I got a saying that I heard a guy say that,

"The stream will always show the source."

And so she didn't go to school,

she was a street kid

and a lot of that street stayed in her spirit.

You know, 'cause she had people that liked her,

they helped her get into Forest Hills and whatnot,

but I didn't never saw anywhere, where,

you know, just in the business sense that she had any allies,

anybody that came to her and said, "Let's open an Althea Gibson restaurant."

WILLIAM HAYLING: It was after the Globetrotter days that she wasn't able

to make any money and she was always trying to find some way

to enhance her monetary situation.

And around 1960, when she started playing golf

and got very good in a short time.

She could hit the ball a long way

and could drive almost 300 yards.

Around the second or third year of playing,

she came to me and asked me if I could help

you know, sponsor her because she was having a hard time

traveling in her car, going to tournaments.

The first tournament she played as a matter of fact, in Oklahoma,

she couldn't use the women's dressing room.

She had to change in her car.

The year that we helped her, she did her best

as far as money.

She never won any major tournaments,

she was runner-up, once or twice.

We got good at a game

that had social demands on it

before we had met the social requirements.

Tennis had Althea moving faster than her social skills could keep up with.

If you were a good tennis player, you got invited.

First you got invited by the well-off blacks

and then you got invited by the whites and next year you get the exposure

and the exposure but then it's taking you further and further and further out

and then at some point,

it snaps.

And you'd left your home base.

Althea was a Virgo, she was very self-critical

and very socially,

you know, standoffish,

and so

her personality played a great part in her,

her life also.

You know she wasn't a gregarious type person.

She didn't go out of her way to be social and to be, you know what I mean?

And so if you could get to her and get to know her

then you would see that you might like Althea but...

She wasn't gonna, you know... She wasn't that easy to approach.

There was some resentment that, um, you know,

when she was in the limelight people were clamoring after her,

they wanted to hear from her, they wanted to see her.

And, you know, gradually that died.

It meant a lot and I think it hurt her feelings.

CARRINGTON: Althea was the champ 1957 and 58

and so it was one thing for her to be African-American.

It was another thing for her, you know,

for any questions to be involved with her sexuality.

I don't want to be the one to say but, you know,

how or what her sexual preferences were, that's real.

You know, um,

I never hear anybody mention it,

I don't know how you could talk about Althea Gibson

and not talk about the whole person

without putting her down. I have no judgment of it

but this is... Why lie about who she was?

BUXTON: If anybody had the slightest suspicion that she was a lesbian

just because she was an outsider is too ridiculous for words.

There were no husbands around, really,

'cause once you got married, that was it, you see,

you hang your rackets up.

You know, the girls used to travel in twos,

keep each other company.

She liked men and she liked sex with men

and that was the beginning and end of it.

CARRINGTON: I think that people neglect to really look at

why Althea had such a rough time,

you know, after her tennis life, after her golf life.

Every woman athlete gets accused of being a lesbian.

Every single one. Are they? Isn't that pathetic.

I think she knew that no matter what she did

it was gonna come under scrutiny.

It was gonna be an object or a subject

for, um, people to, you know, make judgments on her.

This was something that quietly traveled behind her.

Aside from all of her blackness and this and other things,

if you put that with it, I guess,

you end up with a sad story.

As time went on, Althea got more and more depressed

and more and more reclusive

until you just, by the time you got to the '90s,

she had dropped completely off the scene

and she was neglected by everybody.

(TELEPHONE RINGING)

BUXTON: One Friday morning, I was cooking,

preparing for the Sabbath meal, my phone went

in the living room and I went to answer it and it was Althea.

And she just phoned up to say, "Goodbye."

And I said, "So where are you going to?"

So she said, "Well, Angie baby," she said,

"I can't hang around any longer," she said,

"I haven't gotten any more money,

"I've gone through all my savings.

"Life really doesn't seem worth living,

"so I'm just saying goodbye to all my friends."

I said, "I'll call you right back,

"don't go anywhere."

After I called her back,

I said, "Now, why are you going to commit suicide?"

And then she told me that she had run out of money,

she had no money for the rent

and no money for food and no money for medical.

She was living from hand to mouth all her life.

JEANNE MOUTOUSSAMY-ASHE: When she won one of her Wimbledon titles,

the Queen was there.

She said, "You know, I got my trophy form the Queen,

"and then I curtsied, and I backed away."

And she said,

"Because you never turn your back on royalty."

Althea was US royalty in tennis,

but the tennis world

definitely turned their back on her.

TERRY: I think she felt that

every time someone wanted something from her,

they would. you know, call her, contact her,

but any other time, you know, she didn't hear anything,

it was only when they needed her.

And she, you know, got to the point where

she didn't want to be used anymore.

My uncle's personality was a little more passive,

a little more laid back,

and I think the limelight was not something

that he really embraced like she could.

They ended getting divorced,

but they always kept a friendship,

they always kept a love for each other.

BUXTON: She felt, I think, that Sydney Llewellyn

had done a lot for her in the past.

As far as I could make out, that's all there was to it.

They were just very good friends.

CARRINGTON: Sydney Llewellyn couldn't travel with Althea

when she won Wimbledon.

One year, they paid for all the former champs

and their spouses to come,

so she married him so he could go as her spouse.

BUXTON: The love of her life was with Darben,

because he came back into her life again

at the very end. He was living in a home

which happened to be near her home in South Orange.

And every day they would meet at a diner for a meal,

go for a walk, and so on.

And when he passed away, which he did before her,

that's when she really went down fast.

The only time, frankly, that I ever really saw

Althea lose her temper, really she lost it,

out at the US Open.

Each year, they had the champions

come for a certain day.

She had invited her doubles partner Angie

from London to lunch,

and had made a reservation at Rackets,

which is an exclusive restaurant within.

Angie came, Althea go upstairs to take Angie to lunch,

and she was turned away.

Turned away.

This is championship day

and you don't know who Althea Gibson is?

Her reactions were such that...

This is, uh, final insult.

BUXTON: Nobody bothered to come to her rescue.

I think I was the last stop.

And I decided, no way was she gonna commit suicide,

not while I was around.

And I said to her, "How much are we talking about?

"How much money do you need to live?"

And she said, "$1,500 would about cover a month."

So I said, "Okay, look, I'll send you that,

"and you just hold your horses.

"And in the meantime I'll think of another way,"

which I did.

This letter appeared in Tennis Week,

the week of July 18th, 1996, and signed by Paul Fein.

(READING)

"Overcoming the racism and discrimination that confronted her,

"Althea Gibson became our sport's first black champion.

"And she always represented

"her county and her race and her sport

"with great dignity and pride.

"Now she's financially destitute and dispirited.

"She may not last much longer.

"Very few people seemed to care,"

"and our sport doesn't have a pension plan

"to help our former champions in needy times.

"You can help avert a needless tragedy

"by sending her what you can.

"Althea Gibson titled her poignant autobiography

I Always Wanted to Be Somebody.

"She was and is a somebody, somebody very special."

Five months later the phone rings,

and it's Althea.

"Angela, how are you?"

Fine.

"I've just been down to my P.O. box," she says,

and she says, "I've had to have the manager open it."

She said, "The place is absolutely blocked,

"and it's got money in it from all over the world

"in different currencies.

"Is this to do with you?"

I said, "Me? How could it be me?"

I said, "I'm sitting here

"minding my own business in England.

"Oh," she said, "It just smells of you somehow."

She said, "I thought it was you."

I flew over the following week.

I went to Orange. I helped open all the envelopes with her.

They were all different currencies,

and all different amounts,

from players who had remembered her

and fans who had watched her

and enjoyed watching her all over the world.

And it was well over a million dollars.

Well over.

ALLEN: In some people's houses,

they have certain people's pictures.

Particularity in African-American houses

you'll think that there's, like, a picture

of Martin Luther King on the wall,

maybe a picture of John F. Kennedy on the wall,

a picture of Jesus Christ on the wall.

What I can remember growing up,

on the top of our television set,

was an autographed picture of Althea.

TERRY: They're buried together. Cremated remains are together

in the same grave.

So she did want to be buried beside him.

There's a plaque with his name on it,

because she did not want to have any marker.

There might've been some bitterness in Althea,

in that she didn't, uh, necessarily

feel she was given her due for what she did.

I have to remind people

talking about Arthur being the first African-American

to win Wimbledon.

And I was always quick to correct people.

No, no, no, no, no, he was the first African-American male.

But, um, people forget that Althea came first.