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Smithsonian Magazine: Sports Legend Served Up Tennis History When She Broke Through
“When Althea Gibson stepped onto the patio of the iconic clubhouse at the West Side Tennis Club in 1950, a pair of tennis rackets clasped tightly to her chest, she had arrived at the venerated mecca of tennis in America. Here, at this exclusive, whites-only, members-only retreat in Forest Hills, Queens, the a 23-year-old from Harlem was to become the first African American to compete in the U.S. National Championships, known today as the U.S. Open.…
It was a place that, like many other public and private venues, denied Black people access. That changed when Gibson boldly strode onto the court.
Her barrier-breaking appearance at the West Side Tennis club foretold her legendary career, which over the next decade would grow to include 11 Grand Slam victories.”
Sally H. Jacobs, “Sports Legend Althea Gibson Served Up Tennis History When She Broke Through in 1950,” adapted from Althea: The Life of Tennis Champion Althea Gibson, WOMEN WHO SHAPED HISTORY: A Smithsonian magazine special report, Smithsonian Magazine, August 8, 2023.
Apple Books: A Best Book for August
“The level of detail that Jacobs provides makes you feel like you have a courtside seat as Gibson navigates a brutally difficult era in the history of women’s tennis.… Althea restores a key figure of 20th-century sports to her rightful place of honor.”
Staff Picks: A Best Book for August
Apple Books
LA Times: 10 books to add to your reading list
“Harlem-born Althea Gibson knocked the tennis world’s lily-white country-club socks off with her powerful game in the early 1950s. … Jacobs, a Boston Globe journalist, shows how Gibson endured too much racism and too little admiration while setting the precedent for a more diverse and interesting sport.”
Bethanne Patrick, “10 books to add to your reading list in August,” Los Angeles Times, July 31, 2023.
NY Post: A champion ahead of her time
“When Althea Gibson was born in the South Carolina town of Silver in 1927, her birth certificate made no sense whatsoever. Chalk it up to an overexcited family member or an exhausted midwife; both her name and gender were inaccurately recorded.
’Instead of recording the birth of a girl named Althea, the record documented the birth of a boy named Alger,’ writes Sally Jacobs in Althea: The Life of Tennis Champion Althea Gibson ( St. Martin’s Press).”
Gavin Newsham, “Tennis legend Althea Gibson was a champion ahead of her time: ‘Nothing to lose’,” New York Post, July 29, 2023.