Gibson, Althea (1927—) | Research & Encyclopedia Articles

Althea Gibson is one of the foremost names in American tennis and in African American history. In a prejudiced, segregated society, and in the even more segregated world of tennis, she carved out a place for herself with her aggressive serve and volley game. She won four grand-slam tournaments and several international titles, in both singles and doubles. But in the United States of the 1950s and 1960s there were few financial rewards for a black woman athlete, and Gibson grew discouraged and reclusive. While her name is known and celebrated by many, few know of the poverty and obscurity in which she currently lives.

Gibson was born in August 1927 on a Silver, South Carolina, cotton farm, the oldest of five children. In 1930, her family moved to Harlem, where her aunt made a living selling bootleg whiskey. The difficulties of growing up on the streets were tempered by the supportive black community atmosphere of Harlem. Tall and strong, Gibson played basketball with the boys and shot pool in the corner pool halls, but it was the game of paddle ball, played in streets blocked to traffic, where she excelled. When blues musician Buddy Walker observed how she easily defeated all comers, he bought her a tennis racquet and arranged for lessons for her at the Cosmopolitan Tennis Club in Harlem.

Gibson once said, "No matter what accomplishments you make, somebody helps you." In her own case, she received encouragement not only from Walker, but from boxer Sugar Ray Robinson and fromdoctors Hubert Eaton and Robert Johnson, all of whom took particular interest in encouraging young black athletes. With their support, she began to play in tournaments through the American Tennis Association, the oldest black sports organization in the United States. Gibson won the girl's singles championship in 1944 and 1945, and, starting in 1947, she continued to win the title for ten years in a row.

Though Gibson dropped out of high school, her mentors helped her to return, and in 1949, she received a tennis scholarship to Florida Agricultural and Mechanical University in Tallahassee. In 1950, she broke into the world of white tennis. Former tennis champion Alice Marble pleaded her cause with the U.S. Lawn Tennis Association, and Gibson was allowed to play in their famous tournaments at Forest Hills, New York. Though she won her first tourney, she lost the second and became discouraged. The pressure of serving as a role model for her race coupled with persistent money troubles almost forced her to quit the game, but in 1955 the USLTA and the U.S. State Department chose Gibson to represent the United States on a goodwill tennis tour of Asia. This sign of acceptance by the white tennis establishment restored much of her confidence and renewed her commitment to tennis.

Gibson was almost thirty years old when she began the most dramatic phase of her career. She became the first African American to win an international championship when she won the French Women's Singles in 1956. She then went on to win the Italian championship in 1957, and Wimbledon and the U.S. Nationals two years in a row in 1957 and 1958. She was part of the winning doubles team for three years at Wimbledon, as well as in the French Open and the Australian Open. Her powerful game became legendary. "People thought I was ruthless," she wrote later, "which I was. I didn't give a darn who was on the other side of the net. I'd knock you down if you got in my way."

In 1958, Gibson was the top-ranked women's tennis player when she decided to go professional. Financially, she simply could not afford to continue on a strictly amateur basis. However, her professional career never took off the way she had hoped. She did have a successful run touring with the famous Harlem Globetrotters, playing exhibition tennis games as an opening act before their novelty basketball games. Otherwise, she did not get many offers to play for money and had little success in her bids to initiate a film or recording career. In the 1960s she played professional golf, becoming the first African American member of the Ladies Professional Golfers Association, but her golfing career was undistinguished. After that, she earned a living by working as a tennis coach and for state government sport agencies in New Jersey, where she lived.

Gibson was elected to the Tennis Hall of Fame in 1971. In 1997, she was honored as a barrier-breaking African American athlete at the dedication of the Arthur Ashe Stadium in New York City. Gibson herself did not attend the ceremonies, but few knew it was because she had suffered several strokes and was living in poverty in East Orange, New Jersey, depressed, reclusive, and gravely ill. Some women athletes and coaches were horrified to learn of Gibson's circumstances. Pooling their energies and resources, these women staged a benefit and tribute for Gibson, raising more than thirty-five thousand dollars to help with medical bills and other expenses and to found an Althea Gibson Trust Fund to grant scholarships for women athletes. When she learned of the work that had been done on her behalf, and was given a video in which old friends and young newcomers alike testified how Gibson's life had inspired their own careers, her spirits were lifted immeasurably.

Though she contributed greatly to the sport of tennis, Gibson had to fight against prejudice throughout her career, whether it was a hotel that refused to book a luncheon in her honor or the unwritten prohibition against women earning money from sports. Her career is both an inspiration and a cautionary tale for aspiring young athletes: some games cannot be won with skill and aggressive determination. Perhaps a whole life will only be one point won in the game of changing a culture.

Biracree, Tom. Althea Gibson. New York, Chelsea House, 1983.

Davidson, Sue. Changing the Game: The Stories of Tennis Champions Alice Marble and Althea Gibson. Seattle, Seal Press, 1997.

Gibson, Althea. I Always Wanted to Be Somebody. New York, Harper, 1958.

——. So Much to Live For. New York, Putnam, 1968.

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